RIO DE JANEIRO, Jan. 15 (Xinhua) -- Sixteen Brazilian military officers who were injured in the devastating Haiti earthquake arrived in Sao Paulo Friday, the country's Air Force said.

    According to the Air Force, the injured were taken to a military hospital in the city, where they will be quarantined before being released. The procedure is standard for military who return from missions abroad and usually takes about one week.

    The plane which brought the officers home will return to Haiti later in the afternoon with more emergency supplies to the devastated country. So far, six Air Force planes have already been sent to Haiti carrying food, medicine, specialized personnel and medical equipment.

    Other four Brazilian citizens, all of them civilians, arrived in Rio on Friday. Two of them are children of a Brazilian UN representative and the other two are employees of Sao Paulo-based communications company Gigacom, which operates in Haiti. According to the Air Force, none of the civilians were severely injured.

    The deaths of 15 Brazilian citizens were officially confirmed, though the country's Defense Minister Nelson Jobim said on Friday morning that the death toll reached 17.

    Additionally, there are at least four military personnel still missing. According to Jobim, however, the possibility of them being alive is very small, since they were reportedly at the Christopher Hotel, which was completely destroyed by the earthquake.

    The total number of casualties of the Haitian earthquake was estimated at 45,000 by the Red Cross.

Number of Brazilian military died in Haiti rises to 14

BRASILIA, Jan. 14 (Xinhua) -- The number of Brazilian soldiers who died as a result of the earthquake that hit Port au Prince, Haiti's capital, on Tuesday rose to 14, according to a statement released Thursday by Brazil's Ministry of Defense.

Four officers remain unaccounted for, and 14 were injured -- two will be returned to Brazil and another two have been hospitalized in the Dominican Republic, neighboring Haiti, the statement added. Full story

Brazilian gov't mourn over death of humanitarian worker in Haiti earthquake

Brazilian Foreign Minister Celso Amorim gestures during a press conference in Brasilia, Jan. 13, 2010. The Brazilian government announced on Wednesday that its financial aid to be granted to Haiti to help the reconstruction after Tuesday's disastrous earthquake will reach 15 million U.S. dollars.(Xinhua/Radiobras) Photo Gallery>>>

    RIO DE JANEIRO, Jan. 13 (Xinhua) -- The Brazilian government on Wednesday mourned over the death of Zilda Arns, a Nobel Peace Prize nominee who was killed on a humanitarian mission in Haiti by the devastating earthquake Tuesday. Full story

Earthquake crushes thousands of buildings in Haiti

    SANTO DOMINGO, Jan. 13 (Xinhua) -- A major earthquake rocked Haiti on Tuesday, crushing thousands of buildings, including the presidential palace and the U.N. peacekeeping headquarters, and trapping untold numbers of people in the rubble of the capital city.

    The devastation from the magnitude-7.3 quake, the strongest ever recorded on the poor Caribbean island, was so complete that it seemed likely the death toll would run into the thousands, according to reports monitored here. Full story

"Scale of catastrophe in Haiti is very high," says UN peacekeeping chief   

    UNITED NATIONS, Jan. 13 (Xinhua) -- The United Nations deals with humanitarian crises all the time but the devastating earthquake in Haiti has stricken especially close to home, said the head of UN peacekeeping forces Alain Le Roy here Wednesday.

    With the number of fatalities among UN staff members rising, LeRoy said the emotion is "extremely high." Full story