Ex- Hostage Reevaluates Right in Colombia

October 7, 2010 03:54


So, after eight years of rule under political enemies she once called “ultra-right,” how does Betancourt feel Colombia is doing? As she told the Press Club audience, “We’re walking in the right direction. We’re a better democracy than yesterday.”

by John Gizzi at Human Events

EXCERPTS:

But there was one observation Betancourt made in Washington that much of the international press has overlooked but that is nonetheless poignant and politically dramatic: that her native country is “not the Colombia it was when I was abducted” and has “improved a lot” in the eight years since her kidnapping in February of ’02—when it has been under governments headed by conservatives who had been political foes of Betancourt when she was a left-of-center representative, senator, and presidential candidate.

Her failure to say anything critical about conservatives Uribe and Santos is likely to disappoint Betancourt’s enthusiasts on the Left. (The fact that the former senator speaks so often of how her Roman Catholic faith means more to her now and that reading the Bible sustained her while a hostage is also unlikely to please fans of hers on the leftist side).

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