Colombia denies allegations of ransom payment (Roundup)

Jul 4, 2008, 18:15 GMT

Buenos Aires/Bogota - Colombia on Friday denied European media allegations that a ransom was paid to secure the freedom of former Colombian presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt, three US contractors and 11 other hostages held for years by leftist rebels.

Vice President Francisco Santos told Argentine radio station America that 'it was a clean, most successful operation' and attributed reports of an alleged ransom of 20 million dollars to 'counter-information' from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), which has a strong presence in Switzerland.

The reports were made by French online news daily MediaPart and Swiss radio station Radio Suisse Romande (RSR), contradicting the account put forward by the Colombian government that its agents had infiltrated FARC and the 15 hostages through a clever ploy.

MediaPart reported that Bogota and Paris had promised political asylum for FARC members in France, and that Colombia and the US had paid 20 million dollars ransom.

A spokesman for the French Foreign Ministry also denied that Paris had paid a ransom to obtain the release of Betancourt, who also has French citizenship.

Colombian President Alvaro Uribe was clear, Santos stressed: 'No ransom has been paid or is going to be paid.'

He noted that Wednesday's rescue operation was 'immensely sophisticated.'

Colombia's Military Forces also chimed in with a denial. Commander Freddy Padilla described the allegations as a 'last-ditch effort' from the rebels.

'We have already received official information from the United States that they have not paid one single dollar. In the same way, France also rejected that version. I promise you, by my military honour, that in the Colombian case not a single cent has been paid,' General Padilla said.

In the face of reports that the United States was involved in the rescue operation, Padilla stressed that it was a fully Colombian effort.

Santos mentioned that 'several prominent exiled FARC leaders and some of their main supporters' live in Switzerland, and said he was not surprised that the reports had their origin there.

'Switzerland, where FARC have a stronghold, is obviously starting to generate, to issue this type of information to generate counter-information and a little bit to balance the immense political defeat that (FARC) have suffered,' he said.

Santos was himself kidnapped in 1990 by the organization led by the late drug lord Pablo Escobar.