AP Spins, You Parse

The roller-coaster ride of fear and uncertainty are finally over for two prisoners of FARC. This weekend, the communist guerilla group released two hostages. After initially announcing their release weeks ago and Hugo Chavez turned into a media circus, they and FARC were no shows. Leaving the President of Venezuela looking like he had been bamboozled by FARC.

Adding to the political egg on his face, it was determined that one of the hostages had been dumped into the foster care system in Bogota years ago, little Emmanuele Rojas. As this pundit speculated it might have been FARC's inability to retreive Emmanuele that caused the hostage release to fizzle. Perhaps it is because the government of Colombia made the effort to test this child's DNA against Carla Rojas' family that has resulted in the latest miracle. Namely Carla Rojas and Consuelo Gonzalez have been released.

The AP article on their release makes for some interesting reading between the lines. Carla Rojas had been a prisoner of FARC for almost two years before she became pregnant and later she had to suffer a jungle Ceaserean section that resulted in little Emmanuele suffering a broken arm at birth. Now if FARC was truly noble and all that clap-trap, they should have released Carla Rojas immeidately after it became apparent one of their soldiers raped her. But no, for four more years, they kept her hostage and never told her the fate of her little boy until Bogota radio broadcast the news he was alive and in foster care.

And people wonder why most in Colombia and elsewhere think of FARC as evil scum. I just hope the Rojas family can put their lives back together. Now FARC how about all those others you have taken prisoner like Betancourt? When are you going to release them? The world wants to know you kidnappers.