COLOMBIA: THE REBEL NATIONAL LIBERATION ARMY AGREE TO FREE TOURISTS THEY KIDNAPPED AT VALLEDUPAR AND SIERRA NEVADA MOUNTAINS INCLUDING BRITON MARK HENDERSON.

Record ID: 673813

  • Title: COLOMBIA: THE REBEL NATIONAL LIBERATION ARMY AGREE TO FREE TOURISTS THEY KIDNAPPED AT VALLEDUPAR AND SIERRA NEVADA MOUNTAINS INCLUDING BRITON MARK HENDERSON.
  • Date: 21st December 2003
  • Summary: VALLEDUPAR, COLOMBIA (DECEMBER 21, 2003) (REUTERS) VARIOUS: OF HELICOPTER CARRYING NEGOTIATORS ARRIVING. (3 SHOTS) SCU: (SOUNDBITE) (Spanish) NEGOTIATOR MONSIGNOR HECTOR FABIO HENAO SAYING: "The ELN has said that they have made an agreement that before the end of the year this liberation would be realized. We have insisted on doing it before Christmas and we have the po
  • Embargoed: 5th January 2004 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: VALLEDUPAR AND SIERRA NEVADA MOUNTAINS, COLOMBIA
  • Country: Colombia
  • Topics: Conflict,General
  • Reuters ID: LVADG17ICODA4QA7N94RZJRE1F6M
  • Story Text: Colombian priest says he expects release of five foreign hostages on Monday (December 22) .
    Colombian rebels made preparations on Sunday (December 21) to free a Briton and four Israeli hikers kidnapped in September within the next 24 hours.
    Monsignor Hector Fabio Henao said the Cuban-inspired National Liberation Army, known by its Spanish initials ELN, said it would free the foreign tourists on Monday (December 22) in the northern Sierra Nevada mountains.
    "The ELN has said that they have made an agreement that before the end of the year this liberation would be realized. We have insisted on doing it before Christmas and we have the possibility that tomorrow the liberation of the five people will take place in one single operation,"
    he said.
    Israelis Benny Daniel, Ido Guy, Erez Altawil and Orpaz Ohayon and Briton Mark Henderson are part of a group of eight foreign hikers who were abducted at gunpoint on Sept.
    12 near spectacular Indian ruins high in the Sierra Nevadas.
    The rebels freed two of the kidnap victims -- a Spaniard and a German -- in late November and promised to release the remaining five before Christmas. The eighth hostage, a 19-year-old Briton, escaped shortly after the group's abduction near the "Lost City."
    Henao said the hand-over site would be set once the Church-led receiving team's helicopters were in the air.
    The 5,000-member rebel army categorizes the operation as
    "high risk" due to feared offensives by the Colombian military.
    "The police and army have said they have given the necessary collaboration because the government is interested for these people to be freed," said negotiator Jaime Bernal Cuellas.
    Meanwhile hard-line President Alvaro Uribe who went for a swim in a local river said the operations against the rebels would continue.
    "In the Sierra Nevada and the entire country the military operations need to continue and increase until terrorism is finished," he said.
    Colombia is the world's kidnapping capital, with thousands of abductions every year -- most by Marxist rebels looking for ransom money to fund a four-decade war against the state.
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