Click here to hear the official government announcement of the FARC rebels’ arrest. (Spanish)
 
 
The Colombian government broadcast videos on Friday of kidnapped
politician Ingrid Betancourt and three Americans in the first proof
since 2003 that the high-profile rebel hostages were still alive.
 
The videos, which also showed Colombian military officers
kidnapped by guerrillas, were confiscated from three suspected
rebels captured in Bogota and included images from October,
Peace Commissioner Luis Carlos Restrepo said.
 
Betancourt, a dual French-Colombian citizen and former
presidential candidate captured in 2002, and the Americans are
among the most well-known captives held by the Revolutionary
Armed Forces of Colombia rebels waging Latin America's oldest
insurgency.
 
"In a Colombian army operation against the FARC's urban
networks, three people were captured and in their possession
was found proof of life of a group of kidnap victims," said
Restrepo.
 
Brief clips of the videos broadcast by local television
showed images of Betancourt sitting in jungle surroundings and
the Americans. U.S. contractors Thomas Howes, Marc Gonsalves
and Keith Stansell were snatched by the FARC when their
aircraft crashed on a counter-narcotics mission.
 
Restrepo said photographs and letters from hostages were
also found.
 
"All we see is a single photo where she is sitting at a
small table and appears fairly thin, with very, very long hair.
She is looking down. I had the feeling that her hand was
chained. It's a sad image of my sister, but she is alive,"
Betancourt's sister Astrid told LCI television in France.
 
FIRST STEP
 
French President Nicolas Sarkozy played a key role in
recent efforts to broker a deal to free FARC hostages in
exchange for jailed rebel fighters. Earlier this year,
Colombian President Alvaro Uribe freed a FARC commander to try
to broker talks and in August invited Venezuelan President Hugo
Chavez to mediate.
 
Sarkozy spokesman David Martinon called the evidence an
important first step to freeing the hostages.
 
The FARC wants to exchange around 50 hostages for jailed
rebels, but efforts by Chavez to broker a hostage deal fell
apart after Colombia suspended his role as mediator.
 
Uribe said the Venezuelan leftist had broken with protocol
by contacting a top Colombian military chief without
permission.
 
The failed hostage release efforts triggered a diplomatic
spat between Uribe and Chavez, who has said he will have no
relations with Colombia while Uribe is in office.
 
Started in the 1960s as a leftist insurgency, the FARC is
now deeply engaged in Colombia's cocaine trade and has
kidnapped scores of police, soldiers, business owners and
lawmakers for ransom and political leverage.
 
While violence from Colombia's 40-year-old conflict has
ebbed under Uribe, the conservative leader is under pressure to
resolve the plight of hostages still held in secret jungle
camps, some for as long as nearly a decade.
 
Negotiations over the FARC hostages have been stalled over
rebel demands Uribe demilitarize an area the size of New York
City in southern Colombia as a condition for talks. The U.S.
ally has refused such a safe haven under rebel terms saying it
would allow the FARC to regroup.

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