By Jessica Reed
Ingrid Betancourt, once the anti-corruption Green-party candidate for Colombia's presidential elections, has been held hostage by the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Columbia ( the Revolutionnary Armed Forces of Colombia - People's Army) since February 2002. Yesterday the guerilla group said they wished to proceed to an exchange between rebels currently kept in Columbian jails and the hostages they are holding captive in the deep Columbian jungle - Betancourt being one of them. This annoucement follows the President Uribe's recent declaration, who finally accepted to demilitarise two municipalities in the South West regions of the country.
After living a great part of her life in France, Ingrid Betancourt, daughter of a Colombian diplomat, had returned to her father's country to help it "recovering Democracy". In the process - and because she did not fear exposing corrupted politicians, drug traffickers and paramilitary groups- she and her family were sent death threats which drove her to make the difficult choice to live apart from her children, who went to live in New Zealand.
In a 2002 Salon Interview made just before her abduction, she strongly believed that she could win the elections:
My chances? I think I have a 100 percent chance. The elections are open to everyone. The only thing that I fear is fraud in the elections (..) I know I'm low in the polls but those are official polls. I don't really believe in them. When I was a candidate for the Senate, an official poll came out -- it was everywhere, in all the papers -- and I didn't appear in the list of those who were going to be elected. And I became the senator who was elected with the highest number of votes in the country.
Elsewhere - Betancourt: a Colombian Joan of Arc, or just another FARC victim? (The Economist article).
Picture via damouns' flickR account.
