Colombia’s Ingrid Betancourt announces presidential run

By MANUEL RUEDA
Associated Press

BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) — Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt, who was held as a hostage for six years by Colombia’s largest guerrilla group, says she will be running for her country’s presidency. The announcement comes almost two decades after Betancourt was kidnapped by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia while also campaigning for the country’s top office for the Green Oxygen Party, a movement she founded while she was a congresswoman. Betancourt spent six years in guerrilla camps deep in the Amazon jungle, where sometimes rebel fighters would tie her to a tree with metal chains to prevent her from escaping.