A man thought to be a missing US citizen has been found in Damascus, Syria, telling reporters he had recently been freed from jail.

The man is believed to be Missouri resident Travis Timmerman, 29, and he was found by residents wandering barefoot in a neighborhood just south of Damascus.

Thousands of people have been released from prisons across Syria this week, after rebels toppled the country’s former president Bashar al-Assad.

In video posted Thursday, the man says only: “My name is Travis,” and adds that he is from the United States.

Speaking to CBS News, the man identifying as Timmerman said he had been detained in a Syrian prison for several months after entering the country without permission, having crossed its border with Lebanon.

He had decided to travel to Syria for “spiritual purposes,” he told the network.

He said that his cell door was broken down on Monday by two men armed with AK-47s, CBS News reported, and left the prison with a large group to try and reach Jordan.

His time being held in the Syrian prison “wasn’t too bad,” he said, according to the outlet.

“I was never beaten. The only really bad part was that I couldn’t go to the bathroom when I wanted to. I was only let out three times a day to go to the bathroom,” he said.

Timmerman made similar comments to the Al-Arabiya TV network Thursday.

An alert that Timmerman had gone missing was posted by Hungarian police in August, though a Facebook post written by a family friend said that he had been missing since June. He was last seen in Budapest in late May, the Missouri State Highway Patrol said in a public awareness bulletin.

The US is “aware of reports of an American found outside of Damascus and seeking to provide support,” a US official told CNN. “Out of respect for his privacy, we have no further information to provide at this time.”

CNN has approached Timmerman’s family and friends for comment.