She is one of the miracle victims among the thousands of victims of the earthquakes that struck Syria and Turkey. Discovered in the rubble a few hours after her birth, Afraa has now been taken in by her closest family. She will leave the hospital and live near Jandairis, in northwestern Syria, the latter announced to AFP.
The little girl is the only survivor of her family, her father, her mother, her brothers and sisters having all died in the collapse of their four-storey building after the earthquake which killed nearly 46,000 people. Relatives had extricated from the ruins the baby born under the rubble and still connected by the umbilical cord to his deceased mother.
“She is my soul, my life and the whole world for me”, assures AFP her uncle by marriage Khalil Sawadi, who cradles the little girl in a makeshift tent, wrapped in a blanket and wearing a red cap. in a black bow tie. Her relatives named her Afraa, after her late mother.
“Like one of my daughters”
After ten days spent in hospital in a locality near Jandairis, little Afraa was subjected to a DNA test to ensure her family ties with Khalil Sawadi, who is also her father’s cousin.
“The day they told us we could keep her, my joy was unparalleled, it was indescribable,” says Khalil Sawadi, who was one of those who found her under the rubble. “This child is the living memory of her father, her mother, her brothers and sisters,” he promises, adding that he will tell her the story of her birth one day, when she is older.
He lays little Afraa down on a mattress on the floor and his daughters gather around the baby to carry her in their arms and kiss her. His wife gave birth a few days ago, he says, but he spent all his time with Afraa. “She is now like one of my daughters. »