COLOMBIA - VENEZUELA

Freed hostages land in Caracas

Friday, January 11, 2008

Freed by Colombian FARC rebels, Clara Rojas and Consuelo Gonzalez have landed in the Venezuelan capital Caracas where they have been reunited with their families. (Report: C. Moore)

Two female Colombian politicians, released on Thursday by Colombia’s Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, have arrived in Venezuelan capital of Caracas.

Former vice-presidential candidate Clara Rojas, 44, and ex-legislator Consuelo Gonzalez, 57, held by the leftist rebels for more than five years in their Amazon jungle camps, were released earlier Thursday in a deal brokered by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez.

The former hostages were picked up by Venezuelan helicopters from an undisclosed location near the Colombian jungle town of San Jose del Guaviare and were flown to Venezuela’s western city of Santo Domingo, from where they boarded a plane to Caracas.

Television images showed Gonzalez and Rojas bidding their captors goodbye. They kissed armed women rebels on the cheeks and shook hands with the men.

‘A bit of a recovery for President Chavez’

During the handover, the two women spoke to Chavez on a satellite phone from the jungle handover site, thanking him for his mediation. "I spoke to the hostages a few minutes ago. They are free. I told them both 'Welcome to life'," Chavez told reporters at his presidential palace in Caracas.

While thanking the Venezuelan president, Gonzalez reminded Chavez about the fates of the other FARC hostages, still in captivity, according to the Reuters news agency. "Please president, don't drop your guard. The ones left behind want me to tell you that ... We have to carry on working," Reuters quoted the 57-year-old politician as saying. "A thousand thanks. You are helping us to live again."

“It’ll be a bit of a recovery for President Chavez,” Steven Ambrus, Newsweek correspondent in the Colombian capital of Bogota, told FRANCE 24. “After supporting the FARC in the last epic to release the hostages a couple of weeks ago and getting burned, he badly needs a successful operation here to save face. He needs to show he has influence with the leftist group and that his mediation efforts can finally achieve results. He’s under a lot of pressure.”

Chavez brokered a deal with the FARC late last year to obtain the release of the two hostages as well as a young child born to Rojas while in captivity. But the mission faltered after the Colombian government revealed that the child was no longer in FARC hands and was living in a foster home in Bogota. DNA tests subsequently confirmed the revelation.

Hope for other hostages

Rojas and Gonzalez were part of a group of more than 40 hostages -including French-Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt and three US nationals – that the rebels want to exchange for 500 rebels jailed by the Colombian government.

Shortly after her release, Rojas said she has had no news of Betancourt for the past three years, according to the AFP. The two women were captured while campaigning for the presidential elections in 2002 as they attempted to enter the demilitarized zone bordering FARC territory.

But speaking to reporters in Paris, Betancourt’s family members said Thursday’s release has sparked hopes for the French-Colombian hostage’s release.

“I am deeply moved. This is a wonderful step toward bringing home all the other hostages, including my mother," Betancourt's daughter, Melanie Delloye, told the AFP. "It shows that when there is a will, progress is possible."

This is the first major breakthrough in years between the Colombian government and the Marxist rebels on the hostage situation.

“FARC has made a unilateral gesture,” said Robert Parson, FRANCE 24’s International Affairs Editor. “Chavez has achieved more in a few months than the Colombian government has achieved in several years to secure the release of the hostages. The pressure will be on Colombian President Alvaro Uribe to make some sort of gesture. But Uribe will also be looking for a sign from FARC that they are genuinely interested in releasing the hostages and not just making gestures which play to Hugo Chavez.”

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related links

10/01/08 Chavez says FARC hostages freed
10/01/08 Second hostage rescue bid underway