Free Republic

Colombia's left-wing Farc rebels have kidnapped 10 people in the north-west of the country. Guerrillas forced a boat load of people travelling along the Atrato River in Choco province to the shore, before seizing the hostages. Kidnappings for ransom remain the main source of income for the Farc, along with drug trafficking. Earlier this month their best-known hostage, ex-presidential hopeful Ingrid Betancourt, was rescued by troops.

Trade deals with Colombia, Korea, and Panama, all rife with political import, are stalled in Congress. In the meantime, some U.S. exports lag In its Decatur (Ill.) factory, Caterpillar (CAT) assembles a line of the heaviest-duty off-highway trucks, behemoths specialized for use in mining, quarry, and construction operations. One model, the $1.2 million, 163,089-lb. 777F truck, can hit a top speed of 40 mph even while carrying 100 tons of dirt, enough to fill 350 wheelbarrows. Caterpillar has seen a robust market in recent years for these monster trucks, but is worried that companies in other countries will start to...

President Rafael Correa rejected statements by ex-FARC hostage Ingrid Betancourt, who supported the attack by the Colombian Army on a FARC camp in Ecuadorian territory on March 1. In the letter, the Head of State said he was surprised by comments by Betancourt, who was rescued in an operation authorized by Álvaro Uribe. “We are surprised and deeply pained by these declarations that support and try to justify an illegitimate and illegal act, which has been recognized as such and rejected by every government in America” , said Correa in the letter sent to Betancourt, released yesterday by Carondelet. In...

(English-language translation) The negotiations between Puerto Rico and Venezuela for the purchase of more economical oil remain a mystery. The respective secretaries of the Department of State and the Department of Consumer Affairs (DACO), Fernando Bonilla and Jorge Suárez, have not made public the outcome of that country's visit this past weekend. "I believe they're being very cautious about not turning this into a fiasco and, therefore, they don't want to reveal the negotiation in case this cannot be accomplished and thus avoid a possible negative damage to the effort[.] That is why there is silence," was the opinion of...

Quo Vadis TPA? by: Emily Miller, July 11, 2008 Congressional leadership resistance and election year politics are to blame for stalling the passage of the U.S.-Colombia Trade Promotion Agreement (TPA), said Undersecretary of Commerce for International Trade Christopher A. Padilla last week at the Heritage Foundation. The TPA, previously called the U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreement, was signed by the U.S. and Colombia two years ago in November of 2006, yet it still awaits congressional approval needed for final passage. Padilla, frustrated with Congress’ inaction, points the finger at House Speaker Nancy Pelosi for thwarting the TPA’s progress. The Bush administration...

On the day the Colombian military freed Ingrid Betancourt and 14 other long-held hostages, the Italian Parliament passed yet another resolution demanding her release. Europe had long ago adopted this French-Colombian politician as a cause celebre. France had made her an honorary citizen of Paris, passed numerous resolutions and held many vigils...

For months before a group of disguised Colombian soldiers carried out a daring rescue of three U.S. citizens and a prominent Colombian politician from a guerrilla camp, a team of U.S. Special Forces joined elite Colombian troops tracking the hostages across the jungle in the country's southern fringes. The U.S. team was supported by a vast intelligence-gathering operation based in the U.S. Embassy in Bogotá, far to the north. There, a special 100-person unit made up of Special Forces planners, hostage negotiators and intelligence analysts worked to keep track of the hostages. They also awaited the moment when the rescue...

Last week’s daring rescue of 15 Colombian hostages held by the Marxist FARC has been universally hailed as a triumph of military strategy. But at least one group besides the gulled guerilla jailers looks diminished in its aftermath: Congressional Democrats. While Colombia’s military will rightly reap praise for the rescue, the operation was in no small measure an American achievement. In addition to U.S. satellite intelligence that pinpointed the FARC guerillas’ jungle location, Colombian security forces have benefited from $4 billion in American aid since 2002. For this assistance – so vital in last week’s events – Colombia does not...

The Simon Wiesenthal Center has received leads that "Dr. Death" Aribert Heim, the center's most wanted Nazi war criminal, is alive and living in Patagonia, Chile. The center's chief Nazi hunter is due to travel there this week. The hunt for "Dr. Death" Aribert Heim, the Nazi war criminal wanted for murdering hundreds of prisoners in concentration camps during World War II, has intensified after the Simon Wiesenthal's chief Nazi hunter received fresh leads during a visit to South America. Efraim Zuroff, a Holocaust historian who heads the center's Jerusalem office, told media that he had received information that Heim...

Do Democrats Care about Chavez and his Oppression of the Jews? Ed LaskyAmerican Thinker has long noted that many leading Democrats seem to have a special warm spot for Hugo Chavez, the increasingly dictatorial President of Venezuala. He is a supporter of the FARC terrorist group operating inside our ally Colombia's territory. He is a fomenter of radicalism throughout South America, a partner and good friend of the Iranian regime. In short, he is an anti-American tyrant who lately has been trying to impose Nazi-like police powers in Venezuala. He has had a high-level summit meeting with the Holocaust-denying, Holocuast-planning Presdient of Iran,...

The biggest loser of last week's Hollywood-styled Colombian army rescue of 15 hostages in the hands of the FARC guerrillas, in addition to the rebels themselves, was Venezuela's narcissist-Leninist President Hugo Chavez. Judging from Chavez's own public statements and the contents of thousands of e-mails found in FARC laptop computers seized March 1 when Colombia's military raided a guerrilla camp inside Ecuador, Chavez was hoping to use the hostage crisis to become the ultimate power broker in the Colombian armed conflict and become South America's most powerful political leader. Chavez, as well as Ecuador's president, Rafael Correa, had been openly...

Argentina raised the prospect of posting military forces in the Antarctic region yesterday, with the announcement of plans to use troops to defend its interests. President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner told defence chiefs that Argentina must be prepared to assert its sovereignty and protect its natural resources, as nations compete to claim areas of the region believed to be rich in oil. The plans threaten to inflame tensions between Britain and Argentina over the Falkland Islands, which the South American nation still considers to be its sovereign territory despite losing a war in 1982. Argentinian forces were driven from the...

----snip---- Discontent is rising throughout the land, and Chávez’s popularity is in free fall. The president, who is more and more erratic and contradictory, has fewer resources to spend on remedying the situation and faces a unified opposition. Let’s hope that the country’s democratic forces can resolve what is a very tough situation for the government and put an end to a regime that has created nothing but unnecessary conflicts and greater poverty for almost everyone. ----snip---- After the oil stoppage of late 2002 to early 2003, Chávez decided to fire no fewer than 18,000 of PDVSA’s employees—almost a quarter...

SANTA CRUZ, Bolivia | The Bush administration is accusing the government of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez of providing cash and refuge to the militant Islamist group Hezbollah of southern Lebanon. An investigation by the U.S. Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) names Venezuelan diplomat Ghazi Nasr al Din and Venezuelan-Arab businessman Fawzi Kanan as key links between the two. Treasury made the accusations in a June 18 statement, which summarized an investigation of Venezuelan-registered businesses that are thought to be laundering money for Hezbollah. The department also froze assets of al Din and Kanan and banned them from...

FORT SAM HOUSTON - In his first public remarks since he and two other American hostages were freed in Colombia, a US defense contractor on Monday branded their captors as terrorists and praised the Colombian army for a daring rescue. Keith Stansell, one of three US defense contractors freed on July 2 after five years as a rebel-held hostage in Colombia, holds his twin 5-year-old sons at a news conference at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, Texas, July 7, 2008. [Agencies] American defense contractor Marc Gonsalves appeared with fellow hostages Keith Stansell and Thomas Howes at a...

The recently freed Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt has urged an end to the Colombian government's "vocabulary of hate" against her former captors. Ms Betancourt, a former presidential candidate, was held hostage for six years by Marxist Farc rebels. But, while praising President Alvaro Uribe's work towards her release, she said it was time to end "extremist" language towards the Farc. Ms Betancourt is in Paris, where she flew after her release on Wednesday. "I think we have reached a point where we must change this radical, extremist vocabulary of hate of very strong words that intimately wound the human being,"...

Culture: One of the most positive side effects of Colombia's rescue of 15 hostages from FARC communist terrorists was in dispelling the myth of revolutionary Che Guevara as a romantic hero.Che, after all, was with the bad guys last week. The Colombian soldiers who freed the hostages wore Che T-shirts to convince the FARC they were fellow terrorists, and it actually worked. Within minutes, the hostages were handed over. "They were wearing Che Guevara shirts, and I thought: It's the FARC!" said former hostage Ingrid Betancourt. Her disappointment turned to joy when the disguised men announced, "We are the Colombian...

AS THE unmarked white helicopter descended into the jungle clearing, Ingrid Betancourt had no reason to believe that her six-year-long ordeal was nearly over. Looking at the crew, some wearing Che Guevara T-shirts, the captive politician reasoned this was just going to be another day as a pawn in the struggle between her tormentors from the Revolutionary Army of Columbia, better known as the Farc guerrilla group, and her country's government. Along with 13 other hostages, her hands were bound with white plastic cuffs as she was shepherded towards the waiting aircraft. Angry and upset, she refused a coat they...

Uribe should soften his tone with FARC: Betancourt Mon Jul 7, 2008 2:58pm EDT PARIS (Reuters) - Colombian President Alvaro Uribe should soften his tone when dealing with the Marxist FARC guerrillas, freed hostage Ingrid Betancourt said on Monday, urging him to break with the language of "hatred". Betancourt was rescued last week after more than six years in the jungle as a captive of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), in an operation that was widely seen as a vindication of Uribe's hardline stance against the guerrillas. The FARC is still holding hundreds of captives and Betancourt, who...

Gateway Pundit gives us this:SWAMP POLITICS—New information reveals that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was indirectly sending messages to the FARC. The Marxist Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) is designated as a terrorist group by the US government. Speaker Pelosi was doing this while at the same time she refused to bring a free trade agreement with Colombia up for a vote in the US House. In fact, Pelosi took extraordinary steps to block this trade agreement with America’s closest ally in South America.Cordoba-Pelosi-McGovernColombian Sen. Piedad Cordoba (left) is currently under investigation by the Colombian attorney general for ties to...

It may have taken years for army intelligence to infiltrate the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, and it may have been tough to convincingly impersonate rebels. But what seems to have been a walk in the park was getting the FARC to believe that an NGO was providing resources to help it in the dirty work of ferrying captives to a new location.

As we learn more about the Colombian military's daring hostage rescue last week, one detail stands out: In tricking FARC rebels into putting the hostages aboard a helicopter, undercover special forces simply told the comandantes that the aircraft was being loaned to them by a fictitious nongovernmental organization sympathetic to their cause called the International Humanitarian Mission. It may have taken years for army intelligence to infiltrate the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, and it may have been tough to convincingly impersonate rebels. But what seems to have been a walk in the park was getting the FARC to believe...

MIAMI (Reuters) - A lawyer for a defendant in the Argentine "suitcase scandal" said a U.S. government witness has sworn that Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez was personally involved in the affair, according to a U.S. court filing. The government witness, Carlos Kauffmann, pled guilty in March to U.S. charges arising from the seizure of $800,000 in a suitcase in Buenos Aires and agreed to testify against former associate Franklin Duran in exchange for lighter punishment. U.S. prosecutors have indicated that they had been told the $800,000 was intended for the election campaign of Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, the former first...

Nicaragua's President Daniel Ortega charged Saturday that the opposition was "openly conspiring" with US help to overthrow his government, and threatened to unleash "weapons of war" if they did not stop. Thousands of Nicaraguans marched against Ortega last month after the Electoral Tribunal disqualified two political parties from the November municipal and the 2011 general elections. "We want peace, but we're also prepared to raise the steel weapons of war if they try to overthrow the people's government, the power of ordinary citizens," Ortega said on the 29th anniversary of the rebel uprising that overthrew the Anastasio Somoza dictatorship. The...

The Brazilian government launched the process to buy at least 36 fighter jets as part of a broader plan to modernize its Air Force and in keeping with neighbors like Venezuela, Chile and Peru, which are also in the process of overhauling their fleets.

Excerpt - American spy planes carrying sophisticated jamming equipment blocked frantic attempts by a Colombian rebel commander to contact his superiors about last week's hostage handover, The Sunday Telegraph has learnt. ~ snip ~

This video of the release of the 15 hostages, including 3 Americans, was taken by Colombian special forces on July 2, 2008.

The sensational rescue of 15 hostages from the grip of Latin America's largest rebel group has highlighted the diminished state of an organization that just six years ago threatened to overrun the Colombian government. Once fueled by Marxist ideology and awash in narcotics profits, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, now finds itself facing a more robust Colombian military led by a popular president. The group has suffered the deaths of top leaders, seen large-scale defections of supporters, and is being squeezed for the money it needs to sustain its operations. Now the FARC has lost its trophy...

PANAMA CITY (Reuters) - Panama has ruled out hosting a U.S. military base to replace one in Ecuador which is being reclaimed by the Quito government, a senior Panamanian official said on Friday. Panama -- along with Peru and Colombia -- had been tipped as a possible site to replace the Manta air base in western Ecuador, a key strategic asset in Washington's campaign to stop Latin American cocaine from reaching the United States.

Leaders of the Colombian FARC rebel movement were paid millions of dollars to free Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt and 14 other hostages, Swiss radio said on Friday, quoting 'a reliable source'. The 15 hostages released on Wednesday by the Colombian army 'were in reality ransomed for a high price, and the whole operation afterwards was a set-up,' the radio's French-language channel said. Saying the United States, which had three of its citizens among those freed, was behind the deal, it put the price of the ransom at some $20 million. The radio said its source was 'close to the events,...

Question of the Day: John McCain Supposedly Roughed Up . . . By Debbie Schlussel . . . an associate of Communist Sandinista Dictator Daniel "Gucci Glasses" Ortega of Nicaragua, and this is a "bad thing" because . . .? Sorry, but if true--and he's now denying it--this enhances my respect for John McCain a gazillion-fold and makes me happier to vote for him in November. It probably is true because the John McCain of 1987 was a true conservative, a lot different than the one of today. A brief refresher: Daniel Ortega was (and remains) a Communist thug. He...

War On Terror: A foreign country puts its men on the line to rescue American hostages and pulls off one of the greatest rescues in history. Might a little gratitude from Congress be in order?Not since the 1976 Israeli raid on Entebbe has a rescue of hostages held by terrorists ended so spectacularly. Wednesday's liberation by the Colombian army of three Northrop contractors and 12 others will go down as one of history's great strikes against terror. In the wake of the rescue, Democrats' caricature of Colombia as a night-haunted right-wing dictatorship, a la 1976 Guatemala, looks increasingly hollow. The...

Yesterday, Barack Obama’s camp released a statement trying to slam John McCain’s current trip to South America. It read: “Senator McCain’s trip to Mexico and Colombia just underscores his insistence on continuing George Bush’s failed economic policies that have left nearly 2.5 million more workers unemployed, including unfair trade deals that have been written by lobbyists.” Well, the crusty old warhorse may be gaining on Mr. International in the global community, after all. Contrary to what Obama wants you to believe, McCain got a healthy burst of support from Colombia’s President Alvaro Uribe yesterday. Uribe, who’s made admirable progress on...

Colombian security forces rescued the French-Colombian politician, 11 Colombian police and three US intelligence operatives in an operation in the eastern jungle province of Guaviare which saw the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Farc) lose their negotiating trump cards. The guerrillas were holding almost 60 political hostages, whom they want to exchange for hundreds of rebels in prison. General Freddy Padilla, Colombia's armed forces commander, said it was high-level military intelligence that assured the safe rescue of the hostages. "We have infiltrated the Secretariat (Farc's ruling seven-man body) and military intelligence gave us the location of the hostages," said Gen...

The Colombian military said today it has rescued 15 hostages from a leftist guerrilla group, including three American defense contractors and former Colombia presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt. Colombian Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos told a news conference in Bogota that all the rescued hostages are in reasonably good health after being held for years in jungle camps by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, known as FARC. Eleven of those rescued are members of the Colombian army and police. The three Americans -- Keith Stansell, Marc Gonsalves and Thomas Howes -- were conducting an aerial surveillance mission as part of...

14:20 | The Colombian Minister of Defense Juan Manuel Santos reported that the army had rescued 15 hostages, among them the former presidential candidate and three US citizens, during a military operation called "Operation Check". Bogotá (EFE) .- The Colombian army rescued safe and sound ex-presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt, three US citizens, and eleven soldiers held hostage by FARC in Guaviare department (south), announced today Minister of Defense Juan Manuel Santos. The minister said in a press conference that the French-Colombian former presidential candidate, held captive since February of 2002, and US citizens Thomas Howes, Keith Stansell and Marc Gonsalves,...

<p>BOGOTA (Reuters) - French-Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt, three Americans and 11 other hostages were rescued from leftist guerrillas by Colombian troops on Wednesday after years in captivity, the government said.</p>

Colombia says rescues Betancourt, Americans 02 Jul 2008 19:18:25 GMT Source: Reuters BOGOTA, July 2 (Reuters) - Colombia said on Wednesday it rescued three Americans and French-Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt from leftist guerrillas who had held them for years in secret jungle camps.

President Daniel Ortega, who led the 1979 revolution in Nicaragua, says Barack Obama’s presidential bid is a “revolutionary” phenomenon in the United States. “It’s not to say that there is already a revolution under way in the U.S. … but yes, they are laying the foundations for a revolutionary change,” the Sandinista leader said Wednesday night as he accepted an honorary doctorate from an engineering university. Ortega led a Soviet-backed government that battled U.S.-supported Contra rebels before he lost power in a 1990 election. He returned to office last year via the ballot box. In statements broadcast on Sandinista Radio...

Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez Tuesday stated that the reactivation of the US Navy Fourth Fleet to patrol Latin American seas is a threat. The ruler claimed he was certain the move was a threat, and underscored that one of the reasons behind this action was Venezuela's huge oil reserve. "I do not have any doubt about it. It is a threat. There is no need to make any questions. I am sure you feel it that way too," he told reporters. Chávez urged the member countries of the Common Market of the South (Mercosur) to ask the US administration for...

(RTTNews) - Presidential hopeful John McCain is heading to Latin America this week to discuss a free trade, a touchy subject for many workers in the United States whose jobs have been shipped to countries with cheaper labor costs. He has said he wants to thank Latin American countries for their efforts in fighting drug trafficking, part of the reason he supports the Colombian Free Trade Agreement. "I want to go to Colombia as it is a vital ally in our struggle against the scourge of drugs, a great amount of cocaine that comes into the United States of America,...

San Francisco is now providing free, taxpayer-funded plane tickets home for illegal aliens – with an open invitation to visit again. City juvenile probation officers are shielding Honduran crack cocaine dealers from federal deportation and citing San Francisco's sanctuary status as justification for its policy, the San Francisco Chronicle reported. William Siffermann, chief of San Francisco's Juvenile Probation Department, claims federal authorities have never ordered him to stop flying illegal aliens back to their home countries. He cited city policy against turning young illegal alien offenders over to the federal government. "We are not obligated to," he said. "We are...

TUCUMAN, Argentina (AFP) - The 10 leaders of the Mercosur trade bloc meeting here Monday and Tuesday are expected to condemn the EU's new immigration rules, discuss plans for regional integration and address the global food crisis. Ecuador President Rafael Correa, after arriving here Sunday, complained about the European Union's so-called "returns directive" that criminalizes illegal immigration, allowing up to 18 months' detention prior to deportation and banishment from the EU for several years. Correa called the measure a "shameful directive" and told reporters he would be among the first Mercosur leaders to sign a statement to condemn it. Bolivian...

Hugo Chavez faces political crisis as allies desert him By David Blair in Caracas Last Updated: 9:24PM BST 29/06/2008 President Hugo Chavez, the "socialist revolutionary" leading a global campaign against America's "empire", is facing a political crisis in Venezuela where crucial elections are approaching and old allies have turned against him. Mr Chavez has given Caracas's slum-dwellers free health care for the first time Mr Chavez, a devoted admirer of Fidel Castro, has forged an anti-American front with leaders ranging from President Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran. At home, however, Mr Chavez is in trouble....

Brazil honoured the great Pele on Thursday and the other eight surviving players from its maiden FIFA World Cup™ triumph in 1958, a victory that put the nation on the football map and paved the way for four more titles. President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva gave the nine men medals of honour at a banquet dedicated to their 5-2 final victory over hosts Sweden 50 years ago. "You helped us understand...we could make Brazil a winner," Lula told the players at the ceremony. Brazil, the most successful football nation with five FIFA World Cup titles, is now in a...

WASHINGTON (AFP) — Republican White House hopeful John McCain is heading to Colombia and Mexico next week for talks with their presidents on trade and narcotics, aides said Thursday. Burnishing his foreign policy credentials against Democrat Barack Obama, McCain will be in the Colombian city of Cartagena on Tuesday and Wednesday, according to a brief campaign statement. The Arizona senator will meet Colombian President Alvaro Uribe to discuss a bilateral free-trade pact that Democrats have held up in Congress, campaign aides said. They will also talk about US support for the Uribe government's fight against "narcoterrorism," McCain spokeswoman Hessy Fernandez...

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President Hugo Chavez's Venezuela has become the key trafficking route for most of the cocaine sold on Britain's streets, anti-drugs officials believe. Last year, about 250 tons of cocaine are thought to have passed through Venezuela - up to a five-fold increase on 2004. Much of this ended up in Britain. Anti-drugs officials estimate that more than 50 per cent of all the cocaine consumed in Britain has been trafficked through Venezuela - under the "revolutionary" regime of Mr Chavez. The figure could be as high as two thirds. Senior commanders in Venezuela's security forces are thought to be profiting...

<p>CARACAS - Grimacing from contractions, expectant mother Castuca Marino had more on her mind than birth pangs.</p> <p>She was nervous about whether she and her newborn child would make it out of the hospital alive. Interviewed as she stood in the emergency room of Concepción Palacios Maternity Hospital here last week, Marino had heard news reports of six infant deaths there over the course of a 24-hour period late in March.</p>

Leftist ideology may be gaining ground in Latin America. But it will never set foot on the manicured lawns of Francisco Marroquin University. For nearly 40 years, this private college has been a citadel of laissez-faire economics. Here, banners quoting "The Wealth of Nations" author Adam Smith -- he of the powdered wig and invisible hand -- flutter over the campus food court. Every undergraduate, regardless of major, must study market economics and the philosophy of individual rights embraced by the U.S. founding fathers, including "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness." A sculpture commemorating Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged" is...