Madeleine McCann’s father has called for greater scrutiny of the UK media as he told how “monstering” by sections of the press had made him feel as if he was being “suffocated and buried”.

Gerry McCann said his family was tormented by press “abuses” and that the media had “repeatedly interfered” with the investigation into his daughter’s disappearance in 2007.

He said the intrusion took a “huge toll” on his family. “We had sustained interest and misleading headlines for 15 months or more that forced us to take legal action to stop it,” he told the BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.

“We are lucky. We survived. We had tremendous support. But I can promise you, there were times where I felt like I was drowning, and it was the media, primarily, not the situation we were in, being declared argu

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