Colombian soldiers rescued two senior police officers and a police sergeant that leftist guerrillas held hostage in the jungle for nearly 12 years, a minister said on Sunday.
A fourth police officer being held hostage escaped his captors during the military rescue operation and was presumably hiding as army patrols searched for him in the southern Amazon jungle, Colombian Defense Minister Gabriel Silva said.
Colombian Armed Forces Commander Freddy Padilla said the three rescued men were expected to arrive in Bogota yesterday.
“Operation Chameleon,” the most important hostage rescue mission since French-Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt and three Americans were freed in 2008, was “flawless,” Silva said.
The rescued hostages — General Luis Herlindo Mendieta, who on Sunday turned 53, Colonel Enrique Murillo and Sergeant Arbey Delgado Argote — were still in the area of operations in southern Guaviare department “well protected” by 300 soldiers, Silva said.
Ongoing fighting between the military and rebels with the leftist Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) guerrillas were preventing the rescued hostages from leaving the area, officials said.
Padilla said an army sergeant died during the mission, although not where the rescue took place. He gave no further details.
Officials identified the escaped hostage as police Colonel William Donato.
“We have great hope he’s hiding out and that we’ll be able to rescue him in the next few hours,” Silva said.
FARC rebels captured Delgado and Donato in August 1998 in a raid on an anti-narcotics base in the Guaviare region. The guerrillas captured Mendieta and Murillo in November of that year in an attack on the remote southeastern border with Brazil.
Colombian President Alvaro Uribe announced the rescue earlier in the day.
“I’m the happiest woman in the world!” Delgado’s wife, Gladys Duarte, told RCN radio after hearing the good news.
Relatives of the other rescued officers were also overjoyed by the news.
“I’m so happy. Finally my prayers have been answered,” Mendieta’s wife, Maria Teresa, said between sobs. “He’s celebrating his birthday and it’s the best gift ... Finally I can celebrate a birthday with him. I can’t wait to put my arms around him.”
“The first thing I’ll tell him is that I love him ... that I’ve missed him a lot,” Murillo’s 11-year-old son, Sebastian, told Caracol TV
News of the high-profile rescue comes one week ahead of runoff presidential elections in which Uribe’s chosen successor, former defense minister Juan Manuel Santos, is favored to beat former Bogota mayor Antanas Mockus.
The first round of voting was held on May 30.
Uribe, barred constitutionally from seeking a third term in office, is credited with cracking down on the rebels and cutting the FARC’s numbers by half since he took office in 2002.
Santos, who as defense minister was credited with the spectacular July 2008 rescue of Betancourt, three American hostages and 11 military personnel from the FARC, has vowed to continue Uribe’s crackdown on insurgents and crime.
DOUBLE-MURDER CASE: The officer told the dispatcher he would check the locations of the callers, but instead headed to a pizzeria, remaining there for about an hour A New Jersey officer has been charged with misconduct after prosecutors said he did not quickly respond to and properly investigate reports of a shooting that turned out to be a double murder, instead allegedly stopping at an ATM and pizzeria. Franklin Township Police Sergeant Kevin Bollaro was the on-duty officer on the evening of Aug. 1, when police received 911 calls reporting gunshots and screaming in Pittstown, about 96km from Manhattan in central New Jersey, Hunterdon County Prosecutor Renee Robeson’s office said. However, rather than responding immediately, prosecutors said GPS data and surveillance video showed Bollaro drove about 3km
‘MOTHER’ OF THAILAND: In her glamorous heyday in the 1960s, former Thai queen Sirikit mingled with US presidents and superstars such as Elvis Presley The year-long funeral ceremony of former Thai queen Sirikit started yesterday, with grieving royalists set to salute the procession bringing her body to lie in state at Bangkok’s Grand Palace. Members of the royal family are venerated in Thailand, treated by many as semi-divine figures, and lavished with glowing media coverage and gold-adorned portraits hanging in public spaces and private homes nationwide. Sirikit, the mother of Thai King Vajiralongkorn and widow of the nation’s longest-reigning monarch, died late on Friday at the age of 93. Black-and-white tributes to the royal matriarch are being beamed onto towering digital advertizing billboards, on
Tens of thousands of people on Saturday took to the streets of Spain’s eastern city of Valencia to mark the first anniversary of floods that killed 229 people and to denounce the handling of the disaster. Demonstrators, many carrying photos of the victims, called on regional government head Carlos Mazon to resign over what they said was the slow response to one of Europe’s deadliest natural disasters in decades. “People are still really angry,” said Rosa Cerros, a 42-year-old government worker who took part with her husband and two young daughters. “Why weren’t people evacuated? Its incomprehensible,” she said. Mazon’s
POWER ABUSE WORRY: Some people warned that the broad language of the treaty could lead to overreach by authorities and enable the repression of government critics Countries signed their first UN treaty targeting cybercrime in Hanoi yesterday, despite opposition from an unlikely band of tech companies and rights groups warning of expanded state surveillance. The new global legal framework aims to bolster international cooperation to fight digital crimes, from child pornography to transnational cyberscams and money laundering. More than 60 countries signed the declaration, which means it would go into force once ratified by those states. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres described the signing as an “important milestone,” and that it was “only the beginning.” “Every day, sophisticated scams destroy families, steal migrants and drain billions of dollars from our economy...
RSS