BOGOTA, (Reuters) – A French journalist reporting alongside Colombian security forces tracking drug-funded rebels disappeared after a gun battle with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia that killed three soldiers and a police official, the Defense Ministry said yesterday.
French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe said Romeo Langlois, a freelance reporter for French news channel France 24, was taken prisoner on Saturday by the Marxist guerrillas but Colombia’s Defense Ministry had not confirmed his capture.
“The crisis center (of the Foreign Ministry) has been mobilized and is liaising with Colombian authorities,” Juppe told French media.
Langlois went missing after being caught in a firefight with the rebels, known as the FARC. The fight broke out as police and military personnel sought to dismantle drug laboratories in the jungles of Caqueta in southern Colombia.
Three soldiers and one police official died in Saturday’s attack, the Colombian government said, and six security officials were injured. Langlois may have been shot in the arm, Defense Minister Juan Carlos Pinzon told reporters in Caqueta, according to local media.
Five members of the counter-narcotics patrol originally reported missing with Langlois but were found alive. Local media said Pinzon could not confirm Langlois had been kidnapped.
“If they have him, they must respect his life,” Radio Caracol quoted Pinzon as saying. No FARC fighters were reported killed or captured.
Langlois’s disappearance will refocus attention on the FARC after its release this month of 10 members of the armed forces who had been held hostage in jungle camps for more than a decade.
The insurgent group, which has battled the government for almost 50 years, has made repeated gestures toward peace in recent months as a U.S.-backed offensive batters its front lines, halving its fighting force and killing top commanders. President Juan Manuel Santos has said he remains open to peace talks only if they cease all attacks against civilian and military targets and stop kidnapping. The group’s leadership has pledged to stop taking hostages for ransom.
Pinzon said Langlois, who has been in Colombia about 12 years, removed his bulletproof vest and helmet and ran toward the rebels, possibly in a bid to prove he was not a member of the armed forces.
France 24 is working with the French Foreign Ministry and Colombian authorities to “obtain more information about the journalist’s whereabouts,” France 24 said in a statement.
“We know that it is a dangerous region,” Nahida Nakad, head of its foreign audiovisual editorial operations, said in the statement. “We are of course concerned but we trust Romeo, who knows the region well and has a lot of experience.
“We hope that he is safe and sound. We are in permanent contact with his family. The whole editorial department of France 24 is worried and has the family in their hearts.”
The FARC, involved in the production of much of the world’s cocaine, operates across Colombia but is strong in the south, where the soil and humidity are perfect for cultivation of coca, the raw material for cocaine.