"Finally he is returning home," US Secretary of State John Kerry said late Sunday, confirming the release of Peter Theo Curtis, a 45-year-old author and freelance journalist whose disappearance had not been previously reported.
Curtis was handed over to UN peacekeepers in the Golan Heights and after undergoing a medical checkup was transferred to US representatives, the United Nations said.
News of his release came less than a week after a grisly video surfaced showing the beheading of American reporter James Foley at the hands of a masked Islamic State militant.