“Please do not make this a war between missing people's families.”

Ben Needham went missing on 24th July 1991 from the Greek island of Kos; he was just 21 months old at the time.

Madeleine McCann was three-years-old when she disappeared from her bed in a holiday apartment in Portugal in May 2007.

Both Ben’s mother, Kerry, and Maddy’s parents, Kate and Gerry, have campaigned tirelessly for information as to their children’s whereabouts.

And, as a result, some have compared the resources offered to both sets of parents in their search, insisting that Ben’s mother was less favourably treated on account of her status as a single mother.

However, while there has been little to no rivalry between the McCanns and Kerry Needham in the past, social media users were shocked when they learned that the official Find Ben Needham (@FindBenNeedham) had been blocked by the Find Madeleine account on Twitter.

The campaign's Greek account @findbengreek had also been blocked.

When quizzed as to why this had been allowed to happen, the person in charge of the @findmadeleine account said: "This is the last time I will address this issue. Gerry and Kate do not use social media and have asked me to manage the social media accounts for our campaign. In the past couple of weeks, there has been a concerted effort to get people to stop looking for Madeleine.

“Some argue the search costs too much, others say it's hopeless. We don't believe the search for Madeleine is hopeless and putting up polls asking if the search should stop is not only crass, it's cruel.

“How can one put a price on the life of a child? With that being said, I, and I alone, have made the decision to block ANYONE who thwarts the search for Madeleine via social media - whether that be with running commentary on the investigation, posting negative comments about the search/investigation/cost, or saying Madeleine is a lost cause.

“We believe Madeleine is alive and we have great faith in The Met. If you cannot be supportive of the search for Madeleine, please unlike/unfollow our social media pages. We want people who are hopeful and actually care about Madeleine being found supporting us.

“WE NEED YOUR HELP to find her and we don't want negative comments filling our feeds."

An official statement from the Help Find Ben Needham team, shared on Facebook, read: “After recent events on Twitter , namely being blocked by the Official Find Madeleine Campaign we felt it only fair to have our say.

“The campaign blocked us due to ‘the type of people who follow us and the people we follow’. Just to clear we follow everyone back who follows us out of courtesy. Every follower means support for Ben - nothing more. Admin.

“Please read the following statement direct from Kerry Needham.

“Please do not make this a war between missing peoples families. The ONLY reason Kerry ever mentions the Mccanns is outlining the differences in government backing.

“Her problem is with the authorities NOT the Mccanns and their search for their daughter which we FULLY support.”

Kerry Needham’s statement read: "All I can say is that Ben's campaign has never been anti McCann - we can't help the fact that some members of the public give their opinion about the McCann case just the same as people give their opinion about Ben's case.

“I have never once spoken badly about the family, I have only ever given my opinion about the way the two cases have been handled so differently by the authorities."

Their posts sparked a lot of comments on Twitter and Facebook - and they appeared to have the desired affect.

Administrators of Ben's Twitter page now say that access from their UK and Greek accounts has been unblocked. 

They tweeted: “Thank you @findmadeleine for unblocking. We look forward to working and supporting your tweets and campaign.  

“Please can we all move on.”

Ben Needham’s birthday is on the 29th October and his family are attempting to spark a ‘social media thunderclap’ in a bid to get his name - and his story - trending.