Colombia’s Marxist Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) rebel group has freed 10 hostages kidnapped last week, handing eight of them to the International Committee of the Red Cross, the ICRC said on Thursday.
“The civilians were released following a request made by the FARC to the ICRC,” it said in a statement from its Bogota office, adding that the handover took place on Wednesday in the rural northwest area of Vigia del Fuerte.
“The operation was the outcome of a strictly confidential dialogue between the parties concerned and the ICRC’s neutral and independent humanitarian action,” the humanitarian organization said.
PHOTO: AP
The other two hostages freed were handed over to local authorities in Choco.
The 10 were among a group of 18 captured on July 17 by FARC, which two weeks earlier was tricked by Colombian soldiers into handing over 15 high-profile hostages including French-Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt.
The group of 18 had been traveling by boat through remote jungle rivers about 600km from Bogota.
Eight of the kidnap victims — five women, two men and a child — were found by the army on the bank of the Atrato River on July 18, a day after the abduction, leaving the 10 others who were freed on Wednesday.
The ICRC said it would “continue to support efforts to find means of obtaining the release of other hostages and detainees in the hands of armed groups.”
FARC, Latin America’s longest-running insurgency, continues to hold an estimated 700 hostages.
It has been facing renewed pressure to release its remaining hostages after four million people took to the streets in Colombia and around the world last week to highlight the plight of its captives.
Crowds gathered in 1,000 towns and cities across Colombia on Sunday, demanding the liberation of hundreds of hostages still held by Marxist rebels following last month’s dramatic rescue of Betancourt and 14 others.
In Paris, Betancourt led chants of “No more hostages!” as she addressed a crowd of several thousand people who came to watch artists perform in a square across the River Seine from the Eiffel Tower.
Betancourt was rescued on July 2 by Colombian armed forces who said they had tricked her captors into handing her over along with three US citizens and 11 other Colombian hostages.
Betancourt, 46, was abducted in 2002 by FARC rebels while campaigning for the Colombian presidency.
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