COLOMBIA: Ingrid Betancourt's ex-husband Juan Carlos Lecompte publishes book on their relationship

Record ID: 575189

  • Title: COLOMBIA: Ingrid Betancourt's ex-husband Juan Carlos Lecompte publishes book on their relationship
  • Date: 23rd May 2010
  • Summary: BOGOTA, COLOMBIA (FILE) (ORIGINALLY 4:3) (REUTERS) LECOMPTE WITH A CARDBOARD CUTOUT OF BETANCOURT PROTESTING AGAINST HER KIDNAPPING
  • Embargoed: 7th June 2010 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Colombia
  • Country: Colombia
  • Topics: Arts / Culture / Entertainment / Showbiz,People
  • Reuters ID: LVA8KT8XKIY9GPTN3E8U0JOG2ZAW
  • Story Text: Ingrid Betancourt's ex-husband Juan Carlos Lecompte publishes a book on his marriage and divorce to the former FARC hostage and presidential candidate.
    The ex-husband of former hostage and presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt took his side of the story public over the weekend when his book detailing his relationship with Betancourt hit bookstore shelves on Saturday (May 22).
    Juan Carlos Lecompte's book, called "Ingrid and I," begins on June 2, 2008, the day she was rescued from the FARC in a delicate military operation known as "Operation Jacque."
    The world was watching as Betancourt, thin and clad in a camouflage jacket and rubber boots, stepped off the plane giving a joyous hug to her mother and a seemingly distant greeting to her then-husband, Lecompte.
    In an interview with Reuters, the 52-year-old architect and publicist said they'd had a strong marriage, but that he had considered the possibility it may not survive. Still, he said he was surprised by her reaction.
    "I also thought that we could've been together for two or three months and we could have separated after three or four months because maybe we wouldn't have understood each other and we could have changed - I also looked at that possibility. But what I never thought was that in front - live - from the outset and in front of hundreds of millions of people, she would have given me this rebuff," he said.
    The couple divorced early in 2009. Lecompte said it was a difficult time, but that writing about it helped him.
    "The truth - I was very disoriented, and I think the way of achieving a catharsis and clearing away all the wounds was to write a book, and yes, that helped a lot," he said.
    He said that he holds no malice against Betancourt and that she was "the woman I loved the most in my life."
    "And the way - being human - that one tries to survive these kinds of circumstances that are so extreme, the way that each person achieves it is very respectable and you have to accept it. It is an extreme situation where people, in order to survive, if someone gives them affection or something they grab on to it to survive," he said.
    The couple had been married for 13 years prior to Betancourt's kidnapping on February 23, 2002.
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