Kidnapped French Family Of 7 Released

The French family of seven, including four children, kidnapped in Northern Cameroon and taken to Nigeria by suspected Boko Haram militants have been released, a senior Cameroon official said on Friday.

A report by Reuters quoted the Secretary-General of Cameroon's Presidency, Ferdinand Ngoh Ngoh saying that "They are all alive and well".

The presidency source said the family had been handed to Cameroon authorities late on Thursday.

The French family, it would be recalled, was abducted during a holiday in February by men on motorcycles, armed with Kalashnikovs in Dabanga about 10km from the Nigerian border near the Waza National Park.

Gunmen who claimed to have come from Nigerian Islamist group, Boko Haram, later released videos of the family, threatening to kill them if authorities in Nigeria and Cameroon did not release Muslim militants held there.

The parents of the family, which included two boys and two girls as well as another relative, worked for French utility firm GDF Suez.