Seoul Gazette - UK teen missing for years to return home this weekend from France

Alex Batty, from the northern English city of Oldham, was picked up by a driver in a mountainous area of southern France.

Checks by French and British police confirmed his identity.

Police have said they suspect his mother, Melanie Batty -- who did not have parental guardianship -- and grandfather David Batty of abducting the boy in 2017 when he was 11, under the pretence of going on holiday in Spain.

They went to live in alternative lifestyle communes in Spain and subsequently the French Pyrenees.

"He will be handed back to his maternal grandmother tomorrow (Saturday) or after tomorrow (Sunday) at the latest," said the deputy public prosecutor for the Toulouse region, Antoine Leroy.

He would leave France via the southern city of Toulouse or southwestern city of Bordeaux, he said.

Alex's grandmother was not able to travel and so the two would be reunited in the UK, he said, adding he was in touch with the British embassy.

An embassy spokesperson told AFP they were unable to share further details, "given the sensitive nature of this case".

Assistant Chief Constable Chris Sykes of Greater Manchester Police earlier told reporters: "Our priority is to get him back to the UK and getting back to his family in Oldham as soon as possible... I expect it to happen over the next few days."

Alex's grandmother Susan Caruana, who according to British media reports is his legal guardian, has expressed delight over the boy's discovery.

Leroy said the boy, his mother and grandfather had been in Spain and Morocco, before crossing over to France.

For six years, including two in France, he lived a "nomadic" life in a "spiritual "community", never staying more than several months in the same place.

The teenager told investigators he had not suffered any physical violence during the past six years, but said he had been "sexually abused when he was... five or six years old".

- Mother 'likely' in Finland -

The deputy prosecutor described Alex as "bright and very calm".

Leroy said he decided to escape when his mother announced she was going to go to Finland, where she is "likely" to be now. His grandfather died six months ago.

He said the 17-year-old walked for four nights in the direction of Toulouse before he was discovered at 3:00 am (02:00 GMT) on Wednesday by a young delivery man.

Toulouse public prosecutor Samuel Vuelta-Simon earlier told AFP the teenager was "in a safe place, and that social services had taken care of him.

The prosecutor added that there was no doubt over the boy's identity.

Alex was last seen in Spain on October 8, 2017, the day he and his mother and grandfather were expected to return home from the family holiday.

Caruana has said she believed Alex's mother and grandfather had taken him to live with a spiritual community to seek an alternative lifestyle without traditional education.

"They didn't want him to go to school. They don't believe in mainstream school," Caruana told The Times of London.

"I spoke to him this afternoon and it is definitely him. I was speaking to a boy when he was with us and now I'm speaking to a man.

"It's quite unbelievable when you don't know if somebody's dead or alive."

- Found by delivery driver -

The Depeche du Midi regional newspaper said Alex had been found by a student named Fabien Accidini.

Accidini, who delivers medicines to pharmacies in the area, said it was raining hard when he gave Alex a lift in his vehicle and the boy eventually told his story.

"He said that his mother had kidnapped him when he was around 12," the student told La Depeche.

"Since then, he had lived in Spain in a luxury house with around 10 people. He would have arrived in France in around 2021."

He had lived with his mother in a "spiritual community" in France and felt "no animosity towards her but wanted to go back to his grandmother", Accidini said.

La Depeche said he had lived in France with his mother and grandfather in a "nomadic community" in the nearby Aude and Ariege departments.

Sykes, of the Greater Manchester Police, said that Alex had spoken to his grandmother by video call on Thursday night.

"Whilst she is content that this is indeed Alex, we obviously have further checks to do when he returns to the United Kingdom," he added.

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