• The body of a five-year-old boy has been found in the Buffels River, a day after he went missing.
• Search and rescue teams resumed their search on Thursday, having called it off a day prior due to bad light.
• The circumstances around his drowning are not known.

The body of a five-year-old boy, who drowned in the Buffels River near Osizweni in Newcastle, has been found.

According to ER24, it, together with a police search and rescue team, was called to the scene on Wednesday afternoon, but the search was called off due to bad light and temperature challenges. 

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"The search continued this morning [Thursday] and this afternoon, at approximately 13:30, the body was found and retrieved from the river by police search and rescue divers," ER24 spokesperson Ineke van Huyssteen said on Thursday.

"Once the body was retrieved from the water, paramedics declared the boy dead," added Van Huyssteen.

The circumstances surrounding the incident are not known at this point.

Police spokesperson Colonel Thembeka Mbele said that an inquest docket was opened at Madadeni police station for investigation.