Free Republic

FARC, whose leaders are going on trial, is one of the many murderous offshoots of that ‘real socialism’ the Left insists ‘has never been tried.’A special court has been convened in Colombia to try eight leaders of the Marxist-Leninist terrorist outfit known as FARC — Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia — on war crimes and crimes against humanity charges. Perhaps justice will be done upon these eight — will it ever be done for their enablers in the United States and elsewhere?FARC is one of the many murderous offshoots of that “real socialism” that our leftist friends always insist “has...

BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) - A single laptop can reveal much, and so it is with the digital treasure chest that Colombian commandos found in the jungle quarters of slain rebel leader Raul Reyes. Files in the computer seized in Saturday's raid into Ecuador that claimed the lives of Reyes and 23 of his comrades offer an intimate portrait of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez's desire to undermine Colombia's U.S.-allied government. If authentic, the documents show that sympathies Chavez first aired publicly in January grew out of a relationship that dates back more than a decade. But Chavez is not one of...

The guerrilla gives a proof of survival of Ingrid Betancourt (television) The guerrilla Colombian gave Saturday a proof of survival of Ingrid Betancourt in a video introduced by the television Noticias Uno and turned after last 5 May. In this 22 minutes recording, the ex- candidate of the Greens to the presidential elections in Colombia is declared favorable to an intervention of the army to try to release it.

Bungle in the jungle (Filed: 03/08/2003) Philip Jacobson in Paris reports It was meant to be a triumph but the rescue of Ingrid Betancourt, a Franco-Colombian politician kidnapped by Marxist guerrillas, went spectacularly wrong. Now, with her still missing, France's foreign minister is under fire. As a bush pilot, Cleilton de Abreu has flown some shady characters around the Brazilian outback. Two of the worst, he says, come to mind immediately - a couple of armed drug dealers who tried to hijack his plane a few years ago. Both were shot by his co-pilot, who killed one, wounded the other....

French failed hostage rescue sparks row Controversy is growing in France over whether secret agents were involved in a failed attempt to rescue French-Colombian hostage Ingrid Betancourt. France has been trying to secure the release of the former Colombian presidential candidate since her abduction by left-wing rebels in February 2002. The row flared up earlier this week, when a Brazilian newspaper revealed that France in early July secretly sent a military plane to Brazil to collect Ms Betancourt in the event of her release. The French Government says it only despatched a medical team at the request of relatives, in...

A BUNGLED secret French attempt to rescue a Colombian politician held hostage in the Amazon jungle has enraged the governments of Brazil and Colombia and embarrassed President Chirac. The bid to rescue Ingrid Betancourt, a former Colombian presidential candididate who has dual French-Colombian nationality, was ordered by Dominique de Villepin, the French Foreign Minister. Señora Betancourt is one of his former students. The operation ended in fiasco, with French undercover agents arrested by Brazilian police and M de Villepin accused of a cavalier approach that has set back hopes of Señora Betancourt’s release. M de Villepin denied that he had...

BOGOTA, Feb 22 (AFP) - Held for one year by leftist rebels, Colombia's Senator Ingrid Betancourt, 41, has become emblematic of the formidable task the government faces in fulfiling its pledge to root out endemic violence. Since taking office in August, President Alvaro Uribe has fought powerful leftist guerrillas head on, but still faces a massive challenge in a country known as one of the world's most violent, where four decades of political turmoil killed an estimated 200,000 people. Betancourt herself was a presidential candidate in the May elections that brought Uribe to power. After she was kidnapped, relatives...