Subject: Additional news from CNN on release of Birder today Friday
Date: Apr 24 23:10:11 1998
From: Birders2 - Birders2 at aol.com


Hi,

Here is story from CNN and Reuters. CNN website can be found at www.cnn.com

Colombian Rebels Free Ailing Former U.S. Nun

Reuters
24-APR-98
By Karl Penhaul

LOS ALPES, Colombia, April 24 (Reuters) - Marxist rebels freed an ailing
former U.S. nun on Friday, in an act she called ``a miracle'' a month after
she and three other Americans were taken hostage by guerrillas just outside
Bogota.

A team of Reuters journalists was on hand as Revolutionary Armed Forces of
Colombia (FARC) rebels released Louise Augustine, 63, on the outskirts of this
town in rugged mountains east of Bogota, near the site where her kidnap ordeal
began on March 23.

The ex-nun, who was badly injured in a fall during her captivity, said she and
her fellow captives were never threatened or mistreated by the rebels and
stressed that she was ``never frightened'' by them.

But she was clearly elated to regain her freedom. ``I prayed for a miracle and
this is it,'' she said. Two army helicopters and an OV-10 combat plane strafed
hills just above Los Alpes with heavy machine gun fire shortly before the
American woman's release, threatening to abort her handover to delegates from
the International Committee of the Red Cross.

And three Reuters journalists came under fire from army troops just outside
Los Alpes as they approached the town to cover the release ceremony, which had
been announced by the FARC in phone calls to media on Thursday.

A senior army official denied any deliberate effort to interfere with
Augustine's handover, however.

The FARC, which specializes in kidnappings to fund its war effort, kidnapped
Augustine, of Chillicothe, Illinois, along with Peter Shen of New York, Todd
Mark of Houston and Thomas Fiori, of New York, at a roadblock set up across a
major highway about 35 miles (50 km) outside of Bogota.

Numerous Colombians were also taken hostage and although Fiori was released in
early April, Mark and Shen are still being held. The head of the FARC unit
that abducted the Americans, known by his nom de guerre Romana, said the
remaining Americans were likely to be freed as early as Saturday.

``If the conditions are right we'll go ahead and free the other two
tomorrow,'' he said.

The release of Augustine, a former schoolteacher and nun, came after a
Colombian radio station bowed to demands that it make public a communique in
which the FARC denounced what it called a long history of U.S. involvement in
Colombia's civil conflict. A similar communique was to be broadcast in
exchange for the release of Mark and Shen, Romana said.

The four Americans were together on a bird-watching trip at the time of their
capture and the FARC, Latin America's largest and oldest guerrilla group,
originally threatened to kill them if they proved to be undercover U.S.
intelligence agents.

The bespectacled Augustine looked tanned and relaxed moments after her
release. But she grimaced in pain, and had to be held up by a Red Cross worker
as she stood up to talk to reporters.

She said the FARC had kept her and the other Americans on the move almost
constantly, along with about 10 other hostages including a German.

She was knocked unconscious and badly injured on the Saturday before Easter,
when she slipped off a mountain track and tumbled about 130 feet (40 metres)
into a river bed.

Her injuries had made it difficult to walk or even ride a mule, she said,
noting that she had nonetheless ridden seven hours on mule-back to reach the
site of her release.

Augustine said Mark and Shen were both in good condition. She was together
with them on Friday morning when rebels told her, for the first time, to
prepare for the subsequent ``miracle'' of her return to freedom.

Copyright 1998 Reuters Limited.All rights reserved.
Great birding and find that next lifer!

John (One of Birders2)

John+Irma=2, We are birders, too.

John C. LeVine
Birders2 at aol.com
Los Angeles, CA

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* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
The problem with Modern Man is he can no longer
see the stars through his city lights!

A thought on a moonless night in Big Bend National Park 4/30/97


April 24, 1998
8:09 pm PDT