For the third day running it is foot and Madeleine McCann which dominate the papers.

Sabotage is suspected over foot-and-mouth is the lead in the Times

The deliberate release of viral material, possibly in an act of sabotage, may have caused the foot-and-mouth disease outbreak, officials said last night.
The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) said in a report ordered by the Prime Minister that “release by human movement [of the FMD virus] must be considered a real possibility”.
Inspectors all but discounted theories that the virus escaped by air or water from the laboratory complex close to where the outbreak started, although they are continuing to investigate the possibility of equipment failure or a security breach.

Foot and mouth lab: 'Shocking security lapse' says the Telegraph

Health and Safety Executive inquiry said there was a "strong possibility" that the virus came from the Government-licensed Pirbright complex in Surrey, which is just three miles from the two farms that have been contaminated.
It is likely workers at the site - shared between the Institute for Animal Health (IAH) and its commercial partner, Merial Animal Health - were to blame for spreading the disease, the report said.

Meat shortage 'by weekend' Says the Mirror

The blanket ban on livestock movement could lead to a national shortage of meat by the weekend, experts warned last night.
Lamb and pork products will be affected first, with restrictions expected to remain in place until the end of the week.
Beef has a longer shelf life but if the ban stays, supplies of mince will be hit.
AdvertisementStuart Roberts, of the British Meat Processors' Association, said: "If we can't slaughter within the week it will be difficult to source British meat."


THE FOOT AND MOUTH SUSPECT says the Mail

A worker at a high-security laboratory may have released the devastating foot and mouth disease into the countryside via his allotment, it has emerged.
The investigation into the outbreak will today focus on whether the virus was carried on boots, clothing or tools to a parish council vegetable patch three miles away where it contaminated a nearby cattle farm.
In a worrying twist, a Government report said a deliberate spread of the disease could not be ruled out. Asked if the outbreak could have been the result of sabotage, Environment Secretary Hilary Benn said: "The truth is we don't know."

Veggie plot 'led to F&M disaster'says the Sun

A LAB worker digging his veg plot may have triggered the foot and mouth crisis, a probe revealed last night.
Experts think he took the virus from one of the Pirbright laboratories to his patch — near the first farm hit by the outbreak.




The Mirror leads with the McCanns

You are not suspects says the paper

In an extraordinary development, sources told the Portuguese press that investigators had "definitely abandoned" the theory that Madeleine, four, was kidnapped.
Instead, it was claimed, police believe the youngster died in her bedroom "as a result of negligence or murder".


We didn't kill our Madeleine headlines the Express

THE parents of Madeleine McCann were last night forced to deny they had killed their daughter.
They told friends of their torment over allegations that the couple or members of their party were responsible for her death.

Maddy parents' fury at Algarve slurs says the Mail

The parents of Madeleine McCann have angrily rejected reports that she was killed in their holiday apartment.
Gerry and Kate McCann, who have been waiting for almost 100 days for news of their three-year-old daughter, issued the unprecedented denial after a series of accusations in Portuguese newspapers.
Reports said their child had never been kidnapped, but was murdered or died accidentally in the bedroom of their Algarve holiday home.

The Times reports

The mother of Madeleine McCann was close to tears yesterday as she dismissed suggestions that her daughter was killed in her bedroom on the night that she disappeared from the family’s holiday apartment.
Kate McCann and her husband, Gerry, are expected to be interviewed again by detectives after reports that blood had been found in their daughter’s bedroom and evidence that it had contained a body.

Away from those two stories the Guardian leads with the news that

US uneasy as Britain plans for early Iraq withdrawal

British officials believe that Washington will signal its intention to reduce US troop numbers after a much-anticipated report next month by its top commander in Iraq, General David Petraeus, clearing the way for Gordon Brown to announce a British withdrawal in parliament the following month. An official said: "We do believe we are nearly there."
It is not known whether George Bush expressed concern about the withdrawal of the remaining 5,000 British troops when he met Mr Brown in Washington last week. But sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the administration was worried about the political consequences of losing British troops

US 'believes Britain has lost in Basra' reports the Telegraph

A senior US intelligence official told The Washington Post that British commanders had allowed militias loyal to three Shia Muslim groups take control of the city's streets. "The British have basically been defeated in the south," he said.

Adding that

The report said a contingent of 500 British troops based at Basra Palace were "surrounded like cowboys and Indians".

Meanwhile the Independent reports that

Ministers ask for British residents held at Guantanamo to be released

The families of five former British residents incarcerated in Guantanamo Bay for up to five years were celebrating after learning the men could finally be coming home within months.
The end of their ordeal was in sight after the Government formally requested the release of the five men, who had been living legally in the UK before they were picked up abroad by the American authorities.

The Guardian says that

Whitehall officials admitted the decision had come after relentless pressure from the men's families and lawyers, and had been made on the eve of a court decision which ministers feared could see them ordered to allow one detainee back into Britain.

The Times follows up on its lead yesterday

Brown intervenes over the Iraqi interpreters denied political asylum

Gordon Brown has ordered an urgent review into the plight of 91 Iraqi translators abandoned by Britain to persecution and death as a political campaign in favour of granting them asylum gathered pace.
The Prime Minister has demanded an explanation for a decision to deny them any special favours, which aides insist that he knew nothing about.
He will now consider whether to overturn Tony Blair’s decision, amid growing demands from leading military figures and politicians from all parties that the Government should meet a moral obligation to Iraqis who have served Britain.

Russia accused of missile strike says the Telegraph

Georgia appealed for urgent international support against Kremlin "aggression" yesterday after Russian fighter jets reportedly attacked a village close to its capital city.While Russia moved quickly to deny any responsibility for the strike, its ambassador was handed a formal protest note by Georgia condemning it as an act of "undisguised aggression and a gross violation of the country's sovereignty".

The Indpendent says that

According to the Georgians, their radar picked up two Su-34 jets at 6.30pm on Monday as they flew from Russia across Kazbegi mountain towards Georgia. One fired a missile near the village of Shavshvebi, a few miles from the breakaway region of South Ossetia. The rocket, weighing a ton, landed about 25 yards from a house in the village.


New EU treaty is old constitution in disguise, warns Hague reports the Mail

Gordon Brown faced fresh Tory pressure for a referendum on the new EU treaty yesterday after William Hague described it as 'overwhelmingly' similar to the old constitution.
The Shadow Foreign Secretary published research showing that only ten out of the 250 proposals contained in the document rejected by French and Dutch voters had changed.
He suggested the 'unreadable' treaty had been designed to confuse the public and accused the Prime Minister of trying to push it through on the 'quiet'.

Four out of 10 kids can't read says the Sun

FOUR out of 10 children left primary school this year without being able to read or write, Government figures show today.
Just 60 per cent of the 585,000 11-year-olds who sat national curriculum tests this year reached Level 4 in reading, writing and arithmetic, the figures show.
It means more than 230,000 pupils fell short of the standard expected of the age group. Of the total, 120,000 cannot read properly while almost 140,000 are unable to add up.

The paper leads with a celeb story

Tarrant beat me up and needed Viagra in bed

CHRIS Tarrant’s cheated wife Ingrid yesterday claimed the telly star was a flop in bed — and needed Viagra to “get it up”.
She accused the Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? host of being a “clumsy, naive lover”.
She said angling fan Tarrant regularly went to bed reeking of FISH.
And she insisted he “went out of his way” to make himself repulsive at bedtime after he went off sex.


Extinct: the dolphin that could not live alongside man reports the front page of the Independent

After more than 20 million years on the planet, the Yangtze river dolphin is today officially declared extinct, the first species of cetacean (whale, dolphin or porpoise) to be driven from this planet by human activity.
An intensive six-week search by an international team of marine biologists involving two boats that ploughed up and down the world's busiest river last December failed to find a single specimen.
Today, the scientific report of that expedition, published in the peer-reviewed journal of the Royal Society, Biology Letters, confirms the dolphin known as the baiji or white-fin in Chinese and celebrated for its pale skin and distinctive long snout, has disappeared.

Boy's mum blasts killer gang reports the Mirror

Schoolboy Jessie James was murdered because he stood up to a gang and refused to join them, his mum told an inquest yesterday.
Grieving Barbara Reid said her son's rejection of the hoodlums was a humiliation they could not take so they gunned him down.
Now she wants justice for Jessie, 15, who was "left to die alone like an animal" after he was shot while riding his bike through a park.

GIRL, 15, IN COURT ON MURDER CHARGE says the Express

A teenage girl is due to appear in court accused of murdering a young mother who died of stab wounds following a late-night confrontation in a lane.
Samantha Madgin, 18, was stabbed to death shortly before midnight last Thursday after an argument between two groups of people in Wallsend, North Tyneside.
Northumbria Police said a 15-year-old girl from Newcastle had been charged with murder and two men had been charged with affray in connection with the incident.

The Telegraph reports that

Holidays in Britain: 'seedy, costly, anti-child'

Hotels and days out are seen as a rip-off, and the country is viewed as "anti-child" and even unsafe. That is the apparent experience of the majority of families who choose Britain as a holiday destination, according to a survey of 2,000 parents commissioned by Mother & Baby magazine and Mothercare.

It's a rip-off! is how the Mail describes it

The vast majority love the idea of giving their children a traditional bucket-and-spade holiday with its donkey rides, Punch & Judy, and fairgrounds.

But most are left disappointed - and not just by the lack of sunshine.
Of the 2,000 parents surveyed, around 75 per cent said a trip to the seaside costs far too much.
They report having to pay £120 for a basic hotel room, in towns where a single ice cream can cost £3.
Blackpool emerged as the worst place for a family holiday, with Hastings and Bognor faring little better.

Many of the papers report that

Guiliani given headache as daughter supports Obama's Presidential bid

The Indy says

The Republican presidential hopeful Rudolph Giuliani is facing embarrassment after his teenage daughter was "outed" as a supporter of the Democratic candidate Barack Obama, in the first political upset caused by the networking site Facebook.
The post-modern controversy began after the political website Slate.com tracked down Caroline Giuliani's "profile" on which the 17-year-old describes her political views as "liberal", something of a dirty word in the US. But more damagingly, Miss Giuliani was also shown to be a member of a group called "Barack Obama (One Million Strong for Barack)", which her page shows she left on Monday.

Finally the Sun reports on

For duck's sake, save me!


FIRE chiefs rushed 18 crew, three engines, a Land Rover and a rescue boat to a 999 call — to save a trapped DUCK.
Residents feared a child had drowned as teams raced up to 35 MILES to the scene with blue lights flashing and sirens blaring.
Locals were stunned to find the “casualty” was Daffy, a white Aylesbury, trapped in a drainage tunnel.
A woman called 999 after finding the duck stuck between sluices near Earlswood, West Midlands.