SYKES' TAKE ON - THE DEATH OF FRIENDSHIP?

I am beginning to wonder what has happened to the friendly ties between the UK and Portugal. The Anglo-Portuguese Alliance (or Aliança Luso-Britânica), ratified at the Treaty of Windsor  in 1386, between England (succeeded by the UK) and Portugal is the oldest alliance in the world that is still in force — with the earliest treaty dating back to the Anglo-Portuguese Alliance of 1373.  The Portuguese provided a Queen, Catherine of Braganza, married to Charles ll.   A lot of water has passed under their collective bridges but, despite all the turmoil in the last centuries, both countries have survived,even becoming partners in the EU.   But all this seems to have taken a bad turn, and all over a missing child and an apparently incompetent police force which seems bent on muddying the waters and making bad blood between these old friends.  Things are not helped by the jingoistic behavior of the media on both sides, and the interference of loud-mouthed, small brained posters, mainly those on forums, twitter and facebook.  Wannabees come shrieking out of the woodwork every day, imagining they are detectives, retired policemen, dog experts and 'in the know'.  The wildest theories abound. some of which are so farcical as to make one wonder if these people are right in  the head.   All this is doing is causing what appears to be a rift between Scotland Yard and the Portuguese Police to widen more and more.  Surely it would be common sense for everyone to stand back, observe and stop muddying the waters.   Stop posting up wild theories, stop naming suspects, whether real or imagined, stop posting tirades against those who disagree, slagging off the parents and their friends and stop stalking, oh, and please cut out the profanity, it demeans the user.   Try and remember in this morass is a small girl, who may still be alive, despite the impression given by some of the more vocal posters that she is dead and the finger points at her parents.   They disregard the facts, distort anything that does not fit their 'scenarios'.  I will add that quite a lot has come out regarding the state of the Portuguese judiciary, the corruption, the bad treatment of arguidos and prisoners and the latent fascism left over from the Salazar regime, not to be covered here but maybe in a future post.