Ingrid Betancourt Withdraws $7 Million Compensation Claim Against Colombian Government

Former FARC hostage and Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt.

Today in Latin America

Top Story – Former Colombian presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt withdrew her claim for nearly $7 million dollars in government compensation on Tuesday following intense criticism that she was being ungrateful for her rescue.

Betancourt was kidnapped by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) in 2002, while in the southern town of San Vicente del Caguán and held hostage for six years. Betancourt was rescued when she and 14 other hostages were handed over to soldiers masquerading as members of a humanitarian group.

Betancourt argued that her kidnapping was the result of the failure of the Colombian government to protect her while she was a presidential candidate, but the government says Betancourt had assumed responsibility for the journey.

On June 30, Betancourt’s lawyer, Gabriel Devis, filed the demand for million of dollars for damages to her and her family. The demand quickly caused an outrage in Colombia and caused her to defend herself in a television interview from New York on Sunday.

The Colombian defense ministry said the demand was for some 6.9 million dollars, but the attorney general’s office said the total request was close to $8 million and was for Ingrid, her sister, her mother and her two children.

Just Published at the Latin America News Dispatch

Headlines from the Western Hemisphere

North America

• Floods in northen Mexico have blocked the border crossing with the United States at Nuevo Laredo, the largest international crossing that the two countries share.
• Authorites in the central Mexican city of Cuernavaca have found the bodies of three men hanging from a pedestrian bridge, attached with notes signed by a drug gang.

Caribbean

• Seven recently released Cuban political prisoners arrived in Spain on Tuesday, the first of a group of more than 50 jailed dissidents the Castro government has said it will free. The dissidents’ names were released today, and The Associated Press has compiled brief biographies of them.
• Former Cuban head of state Fidel Castro explained in a column published Monday why his prediction failed to pass that the United States would launch an attack on Iran before the quarter-finals of the World Cup, leading to nuclear war.
• A fourteen year-old tourist from Puerto Rico was killed in the crossfire of a shooting in the Virgin Islands on Monday.
• Colton Harris-Moore, known as the “Barefoot Bandit,” plead guilty in the Bahamas to illegally landing a plane and was sentenced to 3 months in prison or a $300 fine. The 19 year-old is wanted in the U.S. for several break-ins and vehicle thefts.

Central America

• Two people were killed and fifteen wounded in Guatemala City when an assailant threw a grenade into a bus full of people.
• Heavy rains in Honduras are responsible for the deaths of at least four people this week.
• A Mexican man is being held in El Salvador for his suspected ties to human trafficking and connections to the Los Zetas drug cartel.
• A Los Angeles judge heard closing arguments in a case between Dole Food Co. and Nicaraguan banana plantation workers who claim they were exposed to pesticides.

Andes

• Ecuador’s Security Minister announced that the country had discovered and raided 60 secret facilities belonging to Colombian guerrillas this year.
• The leader of a small anti-Chávez opposition group was detained by police Monday night.  Explosives and more than 100 detonators were discovered in his home.

Southern Cone

• China and Argentina signed 18 trade and economic agreements during Argentine  President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner’s state visit to Beijing on Tuesday.
• Chile’s Defense Minister is expected to sign documents certifying that three minefields have been cleared in southern Chile.  The mines date back to the region’s 1970s military dictatorships and were on the border with Argentina.
• Brazil’s Congress will vote to approve a state-run insurance company in order to fund future infrastructure projects
• Oscar Tabárez will continue as Uruguay head coach after his successful run at the FIFA World Cup, which brought the South American team to the semi-finals for the first time in 40 years.

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