Belgium reopened an investigation on Thursday into the 1996 murder of a German teenager because of a possible link with the man suspected of murdering British girl Madeleine McCann.

Carola Titze, 16, was found dead with her body mutilated in July 1996 in a resort town on the Belgian coast. 

The public prosecutor's office in Bruges "is indeed reopening the file relating to this murder," a spokesman told AFP, without further details. 

On June 4, German police revealed they had identified a new suspect in the disappearance of British girl Madeleine McCann in 2007, saying that the 43-year-old man may have killed her.

"In connection with the disappearance of the then three-year-old British girl Madeleine Beth McCann..., the Braunschweig public prosecutor's office is investigating a 43-year-old German citizen on suspicion of murder," said federal police in a statement.

The suspect is in prison for an unrelated case.

On May 3, 2007, a few days before her fourth birthday, "Maddie" disappeared from her family's holiday apartment in the Algarve village in Portugal as her parents dined with friends at a nearby restaurant, sparking one of the biggest searches of its kind in recent years.

Despite a wide range of suspects and theories about what happened, no one has ever been convicted over her disappearance.

                

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