four indigenous children who remained missing After more than five weeks in the jungle of Colombia, in the south of the country after the small single-engine plane in which they were traveling crashed to the ground, they were released from the hospital where they received medical attention for 34 days, the government reported on Friday. .
The four siblings, three girls and one boy, were rescued at the beginning of June by Army and indigenous troops on the borders of the departments of Caquetá and Guaviare, 39 days after the Cessna 206 plane that covered the route between Araracuara crashed to the ground. and the city of San José del Guaviare.
“They have recovered their height and weight, they are actually very well,” the director of the state Colombian Institute for Family Welfare (ICBF), Astrid Cáceres, told a press conference. “This second phase begins, which is to care for and protect them.”
The official assured that the children will initially remain under the protection of the ICBF due to a “complex family environment” and that custody of the minors will be decided in six months.
“A transitional phase for the protection of children is entering. They are quite good (…) in health they are quite good,” Cáceres declared.
Both the father of the two minors and their mother’s family told the press that they want custody.
The children remained hospitalized at the Central Military Hospital in Bogotá where they received medical and psychological care, according to the Government.
The aircraft, with seven occupants, declared an emergency on the morning of May 1, due to an apparent engine failure.
The authorities attributed survival to the indigenous children’s knowledge of the jungle and the bravery of the older sister.
The three adults who were traveling on the plane, including the pilot, died and their bodies were found inside the aircraft, although the four children aged 13, 9 and 4, as well as a 12-month-old baby, survived the impact.
One of the fatal victims, Magdalena Mucutuy, was the mother of the surviving children.
Authorities reported that Wilson, one of the dogs who supported the search for children, got lost in the middle of the jungle.
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