Aunt of Venezuelan boy pulled from rubble tells BBC she will give him ‘mother’s warmth’
The aunt of a two-year-old boy rescued after six days trapped under rubble in Venezuela has told the BBC of her joy at being reunited with her nephew and her hopes that his parents can still be found.
Kleiber Moran was pulled from the rubble of his home in Venezuela’s northern La Guaira province by Jordanian rescue teams early Tuesday.
Venezuela’s interim President Delcy Rodríguez called the rescue “a source of hope for our people” as the death toll from last Wednesday’s two major earthquakes continues to rise.
The boy’s 23-year-old aunt, Andreína Sarmiento, told the BBC that she would “take care of Kleiber with a mother’s warmth until my sister comes along, which is what we desire.”
“I pray a lot to God to give me strength because he is only two years old and I am not a mother,” she said, sitting next to Kleiber’s bed and holding his hand in a hospital in the capital Caracas.
“This makes me very sad because my sister always told me that he was my son, now it’s like she’s handing him over to me and saying ‘this is your son, he’s your responsibility,'” she said.
When a friend called Andreína from La Guaira to tell her about Kleiber’s rescue, Andreína fell to the ground, screaming and crying before going to meet him.
He said rescue teams from the United Kingdom also tried to reach him before the Jordanian team’s efforts were successful.
Kleiber is seen in this family photo with his mother Ana Luz and father Carlos. [Handout]
When the two were reunited, Kleiber looked at Andreína and immediately said “Auntie.”
Andreína said Kleiber was “in a state of shock, screaming and yelling” when he arrived at the hospital. But he slept through the night and “stabilized” on Wednesday.
“Today he gives me little kisses, talks to me, tells me where it hurts,” she said.
As she spoke, Kleiber lay next to her, wrapped in his Spider-Man blanket and surrounded by toys, pushing a small cart around the bed. He was in the same ward with other children who survived the earthquake.
“He doesn’t have a single fracture. Everything is very good. He only has a few scratches on his arms and legs, but nothing else,” Andreína told the BBC with a broad smile.
But Andreína, who was happy to be reunited with her nephew, said: “It hurts because I can’t find my sister.”
Andreína and her older sister, Ana Luz, Kleiber’s mother [BBC]
He said he and Ana Luz, 31, are extremely close and talk on video calls every day. Kleiber was always with his sister.
“Wherever he went, his son would go too. Whatever Kleiber wanted, he would please him. If he had no money, he would call me ‘Kleiber wants this’ or ‘he misses that’,” Andreína said.
“She is my older sister and I always trusted her and was able to tell her my problems and when I talked to her on a video call the child was with her.”
Andreína said she was sure her sister would be with Kleiber at the wreckage.
While he was sitting in the hospital with his nephew, desperate search and rescue efforts were continuing after the earthquake.
Approximately 2,295 deaths have been officially recorded, but the final number is expected to be much higher. Tens of thousands of people were reported missing and the United Nations announced it would supply 10,000 body bags for the country.
Andreína said she hasn’t lost hope that Kleiber’s family will be rescued.
“I believe they will find my sister and brother-in-law, just as they found my nephew,” he said.
Looking at Kleiber fondly, she said she believed “he had a purpose in this world.”
“When this child grows up, God willing, this will be his story,” he said.
Additional reporting by Euridice Ledezma
