An 11-year-old Colombian boy has been reunited with his family 18 days after he was kidnapped by members of a dissident rebel group.

Five armed men wearing balaclavas stormed the boy?s home in a rural area of Valle del Cauca province on 3 May and seized him and a domestic employee.

They released the employee soon after but held the boy in a shack at a remote location for almost three weeks until they agreed his freedom in negotiations with Colombia?s ombudsman?s office, the Red Cross and the Catholic Church.

Rebel groups in Colombia are notorious for forcibly recruiting children but the boy?s abduction from his home at gunpoint nevertheless shocked locals.

Police said that the kidnappers were part of the Frente Jaime Mart?nez, an off-shoot of the Farc rebel group that continued fighting after Farc agreed a 2016 peace deal.

The boy's mother described his release as ?a miracle?, adding that the weeks he had been in captivity had been ?horrible, a nightmare?.

Many dissident rebel groups such as the Frente Jaime Mart?nez finance themselves through extortion and kidnappings for ransom, as well as drug trafficking.

The commander of the regional police force, Brigadier General Carlos Oviedo, said the boy?s stepfather had been the real target of the kidnappers, but that they had seized the boy when they found that the stepfather was not at home.

The stepfather, a local merchant, told local media that he was not involved in any illicit business and said he did not know why he had been targeted.

It is not clear if a ransom was paid for the boy?s release.

His stepfather said the boy had told the family that he had been shackled for the first four days of his captivity but was in good health.

His mother said that her son appeared anxious and that he had bitten his fingernails down. He was taken to the local hospital for examination.

The mayor of Jamund?, the town where the family lives, thanked the local community ?for not giving up? and for holding rallies demanding the boy?s release.

Colombia?s vice-president, Francia M?rquez, had also demanded that the boy be freed. ?Ife is sacred and the freedom of any human being is non-negotiable, less so when it's that of a child," she wrote in a statement. (BBC)

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