Iran toddler goes for a desert wander

Link : http://uk.news.yahoo.com/041003/80/f3t9z.html



TEHRAN (Reuters) - A 20-month-old boy wandered for 9 km (5.5 miles) through the scorching desert of southeast Iran before his parents followed his footprints and found him sitting in an open irrigation channel, police say.


Errant toddler Ali Esfandiarpour had been playing at home in a small village near the town of Sirjan when his parents realised he was missing on Tuesday afternoon. He was tracked down late that night.


"His family, relatives, and other villagers started walking out into the desert to look for him," Abdolhossein Moghaddas, a police officer from the southeastern province of Kerman, said on Sunday.


"Police and villagers followed his footsteps with torches until they found the boy sitting in an open channel used for irrigation. The boy started crying when he saw his parents," he added.


Esfandiarpour appeared unscathed by his trek.