The discovery of fresh footprints fuels the search for missing children in Colombia

Colombia continues in suspense before the search for four children who disappeared in the jungle, twenty days after plane crash who killed the mother of a minor, an indigenous leader and an airplane pilot. The latest news is the finding, by a military search party, of some cold footprints attributed to the children.

It is believed to be minors, 13, 9 and 4 years oldwhich also leads to a An 11-month-old babythey could walk in circles, as is common among people lost in hostile environments.

This week, the army also found a kind of shelter, built of sticks, a few rubber bands and a bottle left in the jungle, which is an indication, they believe, that the children are alive. From there, the information is confusing and even contradictory.

The only thing that is certain is that neither the army nor the Colombian Institute for the Welfare of the Family (ICBF) was able to contact the children. President Gustavo Petro apologized on Thursday after deleting a tweet, posted a day earlier, in which he assured that the children had been found.

The search in the thicket continues, and it is not easy. He the place is very difficult to reachtens of kilometers from roads, full of threats such as wild animals and poisonous species, a scenario that complicates the weather, with recurring electrical storms that prevent radio communication (the only viable for the communities in the area) and the use of air rescue vehicles.

Rejected version

In the middle of the week, a version was leaked according to which the children were rescued by the native community of the area, and they were rafted down the river to a populated area, and the end would be announced by radio from the city in the jungle, but this was rejected this Friday.

“Health stations communicate by radiotelephone, so the voices are not heard well. The promoter misheard, he understood that they were children, when there were four of us [miembros del equipo de búsqueda]he confused us and misinformed us,” Edwin Paki, one of the natives who followed the search for victims, told Caracol radio on Friday. 100 members of the Armed Forces Group, which this Friday was expanded by another 50 and that they use recordings with the voices of the minors’ grandmothers to show that the children are hiding or afraid.

The indigenous council of Mitú also announced that the children were protected by one of the communities in the area, but this information was not expanded.

If the children go down the river with someone, it would delay the search, because due to numerous thunderstorms, those paths are impassable for hours, due to the lowering of sticks and other things that the current brings down. In addition, traveling at night is often unconscious.

The ICBF announced on Thursday morning that the children were in the custody of the local community in the area, but confirmed in the afternoon that it did not know where the minors were.

“We would like to know where they are,” said Astrid Cáceres, director of the institution, widely criticized, like the president, for her contradictory messages.