SETUBAL, Portugal (AFP) — A court in Portugal on Saturday remanded in custody a French woman and her partner, accused of abandoning her two young boys — aged four and five — on a roadside in the south of the country.

The court in the southern port city of Setubal ordered the 41-year-old woman and the 55-year-old man to be placed in pretrial detention for the crimes of child endangerment and abandonment after a two-day hearing.

The man was also charged with aggravated assault against one of the children, the court said after questioning the couple.

The pair were taken away in a police van that drove directly out of the courthouse garage.

The case has drawn widespread attention in Portugal and France since the two small boys were found Tuesday evening crying beside a road near Alcacer do Sal, about 100 kilometres (60 miles) south of Lisbon.

They had been left with backpacks containing food and water but no identity documents, according to Portuguese media.

The couple was arrested Thursday by Portuguese authorities at a cafe in the central town of Fatima and brought before an investigating judge Friday at the court in Setubal.

“After something like this, abandoning two young children, finding this couple relaxed at an outdoor cafe for hours was quite shocking,”  a spokesman for Portugal’s GNR police force, Carlos Canatario, told Portuguese television station SIC.

“Their behaviour suggested a certain detachment from the situation, because they did not respond much. They appeared very withdrawn and therefore did not react.”

The couple were questioned for several hours at the court in a first session on Friday.

Upon their arrival at the court, the man, identified by authorities as Marc B., had twice shouted “I love you” in French, while the boy’s mother, identified as Marine R., hummed a melody.

Shortly after midnight Friday, as Marc B. was leaving the courthouse in a police van, he shouted “Portugal Armageddon” toward journalists gathered outside.

On Saturday morning, police officers ensured the pair remained inside the vehicle transporting them until it had fully entered the courthouse garage and the doors had closed.

The children have been placed with a French foster family in Lisbon pending their return to France.

Portuguese authorities said the brothers had been living with their mother in Colmar, in eastern France, while their father had limited and supervised visitation rights.

French authorities had been searching for the mother and the children since May 11, when the father reported them missing.

France subsequently issued a European arrest warrant.

The mother of the motorist who found the children, Eugenia Quintas, told AFP that one of the boys said they had been blindfolded and told to look for a hidden toy.

When they took their blindfolds off, their mother and her car were gone.

“On them they had an orange, a pear and a bottle of water each. We didn’t see any signs of mistreatment,” she said.

Authorities said the couple appeared to have no known connection to Portugal.

The profiles of the two suspects have fuelled public interest in the case.

The woman described herself on social media as a sexologist specialising in body practices, developmental dynamics and trauma care.

Her partner is a former French gendarmerie officer who left the force in 2010 and has shared conspiracy-related and antisemitic content online, according to French media reports.

The case comes only months after another high-profile case involving a French national in Portugal.

Authorities accuse a French man, Cedric Prizzon, of killing his current and former partners in northern Portugal before fleeing with the children he had with the two women.

Portuguese authorities have refused France’s request to extradite him, saying the alleged crimes were committed on Portuguese territory.