VILLAVICENCIO, Colombia—A delicate mission to free three hostages held by Colombian guerrillas was close to collapse on Monday as the government and rebel leaders accused each other of trying to kill the deal.
The Venezuela-led operation to pick up two women hostages and a child born to one of them in captivity has been delayed since last week and it now looks like it may crumble.
Guerrilla leaders postponed the release of their captives from a jungle camp on Monday, saying intense military operations in the region made it impossible for now.
"In these conditions it would put in grave risk the lives of these people to free them," the rebels said in a letter sent to Venezuela's left-wing President Hugo Chavez, who negotiated the deal for the release of the three hostages.
The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, earlier this month said it would deliver the three hostages to Chavez but the operation is now in doubt.
Chavez read out the rebels' letter and accused Colombian President Alvaro Uribe of sabotaging his rescue plan.
"Uribe went to dynamite the third phase of this operation," he said.
Uribe, a conservative who has clashed repeatedly with Chavez, denied military operations had held up the hostage handover and offered to halt army patrols in an area designated by the FARC once they reveal the location of their captives.
"We have plenty of reasons not to trust the FARC," Colombian President Alvaro Uribe told reporters in the central city of Villavicencio, where Venezuelan helicopters waited to be dispatched for the handover.
The three hostages are Consuelo Gonzalez, Clara Rojas and her son Emmanuel, who was fathered by a rebel fighter and is thought to be four years old.
Uribe, whose father was killed by rebels, suggested the FARC may not even have Rojas's son, saying a child fitting his description was turned over to child welfare authorities and is living in the capital city Bogota. He said the child showed marks of torture.
Rojas was kidnapped during her 2002 vice presidential campaign and Gonzalez, a former lawmaker, was taken in 2001.
'Safe Return'
In its letter to Chavez, the FARC said it was still committed to handing over the hostages.
"As soon as we can find a place that offers us security, we will be in touch to reactivate the mechanisms that will make possible the safe return of Clara, Emmanuel and Consuelo," it said.
Chavez, a fierce critic of the United States, had earlier speculated that radio interference by U.S. forces deployed in Colombia to back its war against the FARC and drug traffickers could be to blame.
Colombia is suspicious of Chavez and his dream of uniting South America under socialism but it last week agreed to let him fly helicopters marked with the Red Cross symbol deep into its territory to collect the hostages.
The FARC's promise to release the three hostages had raised hopes for a broader deal to free other high-profile captives, including French-Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt and three Americans, in exchange for jailed rebels.
Villavicencio is a gateway to Colombia's sparsely populated southern jungles, where the FARC controls areas used to produce the cocaine that funds its insurgency. The group is holding more than 700 hostages for ransom and political leverage.
FARC rebels fired a rocket at an air force transport plane in the southwestern town of Neiva on Sunday as it was about to take off, officials said. The rocket missed the plane and no one was hurt
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