KATE and Gerry McCann are to fly to Portugal to face in court the man who claims they lied about their daughter Maddie's disappearance.

The couple have filed a £1million libel suit against ex-cop Goncalo Amaral, who wrote a book claiming the three-year-old died in an accident at their holiday flat in May 2007.

He alleged the little girl's parents then disposed of her body in Praia da Luz, Portugal.

The McCanns, both 41, won a court battle to ban Amaral's bestseller The Truth Of The Lie earlier this year.

Now they are preparing to return to Portugal for the start of the trial in Lisbon's High Court on December 11.

It will be only the second time since Maddie vanished that Kate, of Rothley, Leics, has returned to the country.

A source close to the pair said: "They want to face him. They may have to give evidence against him but they don't know yet."

The McCanns' spokesman Clarence Mitchell added: "It's their court case and they feel they should be there."

Amaral, 49, was the police chief in charge of the investigation into the little girl's abduction.

But he was sacked after several months in the job for publicly criticising the British police.

The book has earned him hundreds of thousands of pounds and he also made a TV documentary based on the work.

He retired from the Portuguese police earlier this year.