The police today detained a Burmese couple for suspected abduction after they confessed to sheltering a missing boy for two weeks amid a nationwide hunt to find him.

The saga of the missing five-year-old, Muhammad Nazrin Shamsul Ghazali, or Yin, came to an end Saturday when he was reunited with his family after disappearing from a shopping mall in Kuala Lumpur on March 31.

Police said the couple were detained for suspected kidnapping as they had failed to inform police as soon as they found the boy and had instead brought him to their home.

"They have been detained to assist us in our investigations. They are suspected of having abducted the boy," Dang Wangi district police chief Mohamad Zulkarnain Abdul Rahman told AFP .

"This is because 14 days is a very long time. We have to detain them to investigate why they did not come forward to police earlier, even though there was a nationwide and highly publicised hunt for him," Mohamad Zulkarnain said.

He said the Burmese couple were refugees registered with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in Malaysia. They have been residing here for the past 19 years.

Kuala Lumpur acting police chief Zul Hasnan Najib Baharudin said the couple were believed to be beggers and had allegedly used Yin to beg for money as well, state Bernama news agency reported today.

"The police have received information from a witness who claims that the couple used the child to beg for money around the Klang Valley," Zul Hasnan said, according to Bernama .

Missing from mall

He said medical checks on the boy also revealed that he had never suffered from chicken pox, as was claimed by the couple after they were questioned by police on why they had shaved Yin's head bald.

The couple had been sheltering Yin at their home in the suburbs of the city after they found him trying to cross a busy street alone in front of the mall, the Star newspaper on Sunday said.

They claim to have only realised he was a missing boy after seeing a poster of Yin at the mall on Saturday, the newspaper said.

They promptly contacted a number on the poster which led to Yin being reunited with his family.

Yin's father, Shamsul Ghazali Shamsudin, could not be reached for comment.

Yin's disappearance was widely covered by the local media, with most newspapers carrying a missing person's picture in efforts to help find the boy.

Thousands of posters were also distributed at locations around the country and a reward of RM15,000 was offered for information on his whereabouts.