Kate McCann told a Portuguese court today how her son Sean, 9, asked her about claims she had hidden Madeleine.

The little boy, who was under two years old when his sister disappeared, questioned her after hearing the allegations made by the former Portuguese police chief Goncalo Amaral on the radio, while he was travelling on the school bus.

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Speaking to Lisbon's Palace of Justice, Kate said: “Sean asked me in October ‘Mr Amaral said you hid Madeleine’.

"I just said that he said a lot of silly things."

Kate also revealed that claims about her role in Madeleleine's disappearance - written in Amaral's book, The Truth of the Lie - has had a devastating effect on her family.

She said: “I believe after the book things got worse and were compounded because we were in a more desperate situation and felt defeated.”

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As she finished her evidence Kate, 46, said: “I do believe in freedom of speech, but I don’t believe freedom of speech means the freedom to slander.”

Madeleine, who was nearly four at the time of her disappearance, vanished from her family's holiday apartment in Praia da Luz in the Algarve on May 3 2007.

Kate and husband Gerry have since claimed that allegations made by Mr Amaral damaged the initial hunt for Madeleine - and increased their anguish.

But the former cop, 56, insists everything written in the book was already contained in the public police and court case files.

READ: PARENTS OF MISSING CHILDREN SHARE THEIR SIDE OF THE STORY

He said on his blog: "Soon, very soon, the world will know the truth about the lie and we will gain truth and justice for a little girl who has no voice, dead on the evening of May 3rd."

The trial continues.