Uribe says Betancourt may be out of Colombia
Source: Reuters
BOGOTA, Feb 21 (Reuters) - Former Colombian presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt, kidnapped by Marxist rebels during her 2002 campaign, may have been taken to another country by her captors, President Alvaro Uribe said on Wednesday. "It is a possibility we have been studying. We have heard some versions of this," Uribe told reporters, declining to give more details. Colombia borders Venezuela, Ecuador, Peru and Brazil. Colombian officials say the guerrillas sometimes hide out in poorly patrolled border areas in neighboring countries. With the five-year anniversary of the kidnapping approaching this week, Uribe said his government continues trying to find Betancourt and scores of other politicians and officials held by the four-decade-old Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC. The 17,000-member rebel army is also holding three American defense contractors kidnapped in 2003 while on a mission to locate coca crops used to make the cocaine that funds the insurgency. Dual French-Colombian citizen Betancourt and the Americans are among 61 FARC hostages the government wants to exchange for rebels held in government jails. But the two sides have not agreed on terms for holding talks that might lead to a swap. The FARC was organized in the 1960s to force land reforms and other measures meant to close the wide gap that separates rich and poor in this Andean country. But even left-wing politicians say the group has scant popular support.
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