Colombia - Ingrid Betancourt - release

Mass demo to demand hostages' release

Tuesday 05 June 2007

Colombia came to a standstill earlier as hundreds of thousands massed on the streets to protest kidnappings by FARC guerrillas.

Millions of Colombian protesters demand hostages' release

Millions of Colombians wore white shirts and waved white handkerchiefs in demonstrations across the country Thursday demanding the release of thousands of hostages held by various armed groups.
  
At midday, a cacophony of car horns, church bells and whistles resonated in major cities while Colombians waved their handkerchiefs in a protest called after 11 hostages held by leftist rebels were killed last month.
  
The protesters demanded "freedom without conditions now" for the more than 3,000 people held hostage by guerrillas, right-wing paramilitary groups and criminals across the Andean nation.
  
Families of hostages, non-governmental groups and the Roman Catholic church organized the protest after the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, a Marxist guerrilla group known as FARC, said 11 provincial lawmakers it had held hostage were killed in a military raid, which the government said never happened.
  
The government, which has been battling insurgencies and cocaine trafficking for decades, accuses FARC of having executed the lawmakers, held hostage since 2002.
  
The lawmakers were among a group of 56 hostages, including Franco-Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt and three Americans, who FARC wants to swap for 500 of its militants held in prison.
  
The Free Country Foundation, an independent NGO, estimates that FARC is holding about 765 hostages.
  
The protests came on the same day that FARC released a Colombian geologist, Juan Carlos Posada, who had been kidnapped in the eastern province of Choco in March, the International Committee of the Red Cross said.