COLOMBIA:Colombia will free hundreds of guerrilla fighters if rebel leaders release politician Ingrid Betancourt, who is in ill-health after being held hostage for years in secret jungle camps, the government said.
President Alvaro Uribe signed a decree late on Thursday allowing a mass release of guerrillas from jail if Ms Betancourt, a French-Colombian dual national who was kidnapped during her 2002 presidential campaign and is ailing from hepatitis B, is set free.
The move was an attempt to speed up efforts at swapping rebel-held politicians, police and soldiers for jailed guerrillas after months of haggling over conditions.
"The immediate release of Betancourt would be enough for us to consider the humanitarian exchange under way, in that we would conditionally suspend the sentences of guerrillas who are part of the agreement," the government's peace commissioner, Luis Carlos Restrepo, told reporters.
The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or Farc, is holding hundreds of hostages for ransom and political leverage, including three American anti-drug contractors captured in 2003. But Ms Betancourt's case has drawn the most attention.
Colombia's Roman Catholic Church called on the FARC on Friday to release Ms Betancourt, a 46-year-old mother-of-two, and all other kidnap victims, describing it as an issue of life or death.
"We don't even know who to go to as the head of the Farc, so we are sending a general call out to all of them," a Church spokesman told reporters.
The Farc, which took up arms in the 1960s, and the government have been deadlocked over conditions for exchanging dozens of high-profile hostages for rebels held in government jails.
"The legal basis for a humanitarian exchange has been established and we have reduced the requirements as much as possible," Mr Restrepo said.
Despite hard lobbying for a hostage swap by the families of kidnap victims and the French government, an agreement appeared less likely after Colombia killed the Farc's number two commander in a March 1st bombing raid carried out in neighbouring Ecuador.
Earlier on Thursday, Colombian human rights ombudsman Wolmar Perez said Ms Betancourt's health was "very, very delicate". Reports received by Mr Perez's office say Ms Betancourt appears malnourished and her skin is raw with infected insect bites.
"The government has joined the national and international cry that the life of Ingrid Betancourt be saved," Mr Restrepo said. -