This just in from Aporrea: Three hostages have just been released by the FARC rebels in Colombia, to be handed over in response to negotiations with president Hugo Chavez of Venezuela and senator Piedad Cordoba of Colombia. They are Clara Rojas (presidential running-mate of Ingrid Betancourt), her son Emanuel, and Consuelo Gonzalez.
Here’s the video:
The hostages will be handed over to Chavez, or whomever he designates as a go-between. (Piedad Cordoba seems an obvious choice to me.)
The newsdesk at Globovision was able to contact Clara Rojas’s mother by phone. She is understandably very emotional at the good news.
The second caller, Juan Carlos Lecompte (Ingrid Betancourt’s husband), characterizes this as a major goodwill gesture. Clearly, everyone is hoping Ingrid will be next on the list of those released.
Oh, and to all you right-wing windsocks at FrontPage Magazine: You can stow your cutesy headlines now. Nobody “FARCed up” (except Alvaro Uribe); the negotiators were successful despite the idiocy–or more likely, deliberate sabotage–on the part of the Colombian government. It’s worth reminding y’all that Ingrid Betancourt’s family–and the French government–have all been solidly behind the Chavez/Cordoba negotiations the whole time, and when Uribe called them off, there was a huge clamor for reinstatement. Like it or not, President Chavez is the only political leader the FARC respect enough to make such a gesture. That should tell you something about him. You may want to keep your future words on Chavecito soft and sweet, in case you have to eat them again.
