Carrying news, Colombia hostage flies back to Bogota

BOGOTA (Reuters) - A Colombian hostage freed after years in guerrilla captivity returned to Bogota on Monday carrying letters and photographs from fellow kidnap victims left behind in secret jungle camps.

Former congresswoman Consuelo Gonzalez was released last week by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia with another hostage, Clara Rojas, after Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez secured a deal to free them and fly them to Caracas.

The release of the two high-profile captives fueled hopes the guerrillas, known as the FARC, could agree to a humanitarian deal to free other hostages, including French-Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt and three Americans.

Gonzalez on Monday flew back to Bogota, where families of other hostages waited for letters, notes and images of captives held by Latin America's oldest insurgency, some of whom they have not heard from for as long as five years.

"I bring with me proof of the life of my companions from the camp, they are eight pieces of evidence from eight people who are still hoping to be free," said Gonzalez, wearing a white T-shirt that read "Freedom for them all Now."

Captured with Betancourt during her 2002 presidential campaign, Rojas gave birth to a son, Emmanuel, in 2004. When he was 8 months old the boy was turned over by the FARC to a peasant family. Mother and son were reunited in Bogota on Sunday.

The FARC and U.S. ally President Alvaro Uribe remain deadlocked over conditions for any deal to swap dozens of high-profile captives -- including police officers, soldiers and politicians -- for jailed guerrillas.

Violence from Colombia's conflict has ebbed under Uribe, but in a reminder of the still complex kidnapping situation, guerrillas on Sunday snatched six local tourists traveling by boat on the remote Pacific coast, the Navy said.

The tourists were intercepted as they visited a beach where armed men stole fuel, cash and mobile phones before escorting the six into the jungle. The FARC is holding hundreds of hostages for ransom and political leverage.

DEADLOCKED OVER HOSTAGE DEAL

After an initial failed attempt at New Year, Chavez last week helped negotiate the release of Rojas and Gonzalez, who were held for more than five years in jungle camps by the FARC, which Washington brands a drug-trafficking terrorist group.

Attempts to free FARC captives have recently intensified with French President Nicolas Sarkozy calling Betancourt's release a high foreign policy priority.

But Chavez, a foe of Washington, has stirred tensions with Colombia by demanding Uribe recognize the rebel's political status. He has urged foreign governments to take the group off their lists of terrorist organizations.

Uribe rejected that suggestion as unrealistic and assailed the FARC over reports that it kept hostages caged and in shackles around the clock.

"The hostages are being tortured, which backs up the argument that the FARC is a terrorist group," Uribe said at a news conference during a visit to Guatemala.

The rebels, who began as a peasant army in the 1960s but have been driven back into the jungle, insist that Uribe pull troops from an area southwest Colombia roughly the size of New York City to facilitate any hostage deal.

Uribe, a hard-liner whose father was killed in a botched FARC kidnapping more than 20 years ago, says creating such a safe haven would allow the guerrillas to regroup as they did in a similar demilitarized zone under his predecessor.

(Additional reporting by Mica Rosenberg in Guatemala City; Editing by Jason Lange)