“After arduous search efforts by our military forces, we have located the four missing children following a plane crash, and they are alive,” Petro wrote on Twitter.
Authorities deployed more than 100 troops with sniffer dogs to search for children who were on a plane that crashed in the Amazon on May 1, killing their mother and two other adults.
Rescue teams believe the four Aboriginal brothers, three children aged 13, 9 and 4 and an 11-month-old baby, have been wandering the rainforest in the southern province of Caqueta since their plane crash on May 1.
Earlier on Wednesday, the armed forces said search efforts had intensified after rescuers found an “improvised shelter with logs and branches”, bolstering their belief that the children were alive.
In photos released by the armed forces, scissors and a hair tie appeared between branches on the forest floor.
Before that, a bottle and a half-eaten fruit were found.
Between Monday and Tuesday, the military found the bodies of the pilot and two adults who were traveling from the jungle to San Jose del Guaviare, one of the main towns in the Amazon rainforest in Colombia.
Among the dead was Ranoc Mokotoi, the mother of four children, an Huitutu.
The search was hampered by giant trees up to 40 meters high, wild animals and heavy rain, which made Operation Hope difficult.
Three helicopters were used to help, one of which carried a recorded message from the children’s grandmother in Huitoto warning them not to travel in the forest.
Authorities did not specify the cause of the accident.
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