A British boy who was found in France after going missing for six years has landed safely back in the UK, according to local police. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt gives me great pleasure to say Alex has now made his safe return back to the UK after six years,\u201d Assistant Chief Constable Matt Boyle, of Greater Manchester Police, told reporters on Saturday, according to the UK\u2019s national news agency, Press Association. <\/p>\n
The teenager met with a family member and UK police officers in the Toulouse airport before beginning his much-belated flight home, Boyle also said. <\/p>\n
Batty is expected to be reunited with his grandmother Susan Caruana, who lives in Oldham, Greater Manchester, and is the boy\u2019s legal guardian, PA reported. <\/p>\n
In a statement issued through police, Caruana said she \u201ccan\u2019t wait\u201d to see her grandson. <\/p>\n
\u201cI cannot begin to express my relief and happiness that\u00a0Alex\u00a0has been found safe and well,\u201d she said, adding that her family request privacy as they welcome him back. <\/p>\n
It is understood that Alex\u2019s grandfather died around six months ago, and that the boy\u2019s mother \u2013 who does not have legal parental guardianship \u2013 may currently be in Finland, Reuters news agency reported citing Toulouse\u2019s deputy prosecutor Antoine Leroy. <\/p>\n
The teenager was recovered this week from the side of the road by a French motorist, Fabien Accidini, who claimed the boy had been living in a \u201cspiritual community\u201d in the country for the last two years. <\/p>\n
Accidini, a chiropractic student, had been delivering medicines to pharmacies overnight when he first came across Batty. After initially giving him a false name, Batty spoke to Accidini for three hours in English and French. <\/p>\n
Accidini said the boy described his mother as \u201ca bit crazy.\u201d <\/p>\n
Speaking to the BBC, a local from Quillan \u2013 the town where Alex was found \u2013 described how the area was home to a community of international nomads who have shunned a \u201cnormal life.\u201d <\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of people here think they\u2019re wrongdoers, high on drugs, but you find drugs everywhere. They just want an alternative life,\u201d she told the outlet. <\/p>\n\n
A British boy who was found in France after going missing for six years has landed safely back in the UK, according to local police. \u201cIt gives me great pleasure to say Alex has now made his safe return back to the UK after six years,\u201d Assistant Chief Constable Matt Boyle, of Greater Manchester Police, <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":12933,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-12932","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12932","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12932"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12932\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12933"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12932"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12932"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12932"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}