The parents of Madeleine McCann will join families of other vanished youngsters today to mark International Missing Children's Day.

Kate and Gerry McCann will attend an event on London's South Bank to publicise the plight of the mothers and fathers left wondering what happened to their children many years after their disappearance.

The couple, from Leicestershire, England, recently marked the second anniversary of their daughter Madeleine going missing from their holiday flat in Praia da Luz, southern Portugal, on May 3, 2007, just days before her fourth birthday.

Also taking part in the event will be the mother and sister of Katrice Lee, who was two when she disappeared from a Naafi shopping complex in Paderborn, Germany, on November 28, 1981.

Natasha Lee, Katrice's sister, will make a speech and read a short poem.

Charity

There will also be speeches from ChildLine founder Esther Rantzen, chief constable Peter Neyroud, chief executive of the National Policing Improvement Agency, and Andy McCullough, from runaway children's charity, Railway Children.

Balloons featuring the faces of missing children will be displayed at the event, which is hosted by the National Policing Improvement Agency.

The event will also highlight today's launch of a 'forget-me-not' campaign to help bring missing children home.

Parents & Abducted Children Together (Pact) is working with Tesco on the campaign, which is selling forget-me-not ribbons, badges and wrist bands to raise funds and awareness.

It will also display posters of missing children and link its website to www.missingkids.co.uk. 

Pact's founder, Catherine Meyer, said: "It is vitally important to increase public awareness of the problem of missing children if effective action is to be taken.

"Our ability to tackle the dreadful statistics -- some 100,000 children missing every year -- is hampered by lack of information.

"From why children go missing in the first place, to what happens to them next -- our information is incomplete and co-ordination between the police, NGOs and private sector could be much, much better."

Tesco executive director, Lucy Neville-Rolfe, said: "Tesco have been supporting this important cause since 2002, by putting up posters in our stores. This raises visibility of missing children with millions of customers every week.

Faster

"This year we are also helping the campaign by selling forget-me-not badges, wristbands and ribbons in our larger stores, hoping that together we can find more missing children, faster."

hnews@herald.ie

- Sam Marsden