French journalist taken hostage
A French journalist reported missing in Colombia after a gunbattle between government forces and leftist rebels has apparently been kidnapped, French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe said Sunday.
Earlier, officials said that French television reporter Roméo Langlois, 35, went missing on Saturday when he was with a military and police patrol in Caqueta province ambushed by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC).
Three soldiers and one police officer were killed in the attack and five others remain missing, Colombian military officials said. Four other soldiers were also wounded during the operation Counternarcotics Batallion No. 1 that destroyed five cocaine processing labs, according to Colombian security services.
"The French journalist was accompanying the army unit in the course of an anti-drug operation when the unit came under attack from FARC forces," said a French embassy official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Colombian authorities have launched a search operation.
Global television network France 24 said that Langlois had been on assignment for them, reporting alongside Colombian forces carrying out anti-narcotic operations in the south of the country.
The Colombian defence minister added that Langlois was shot in the arm during a gun battle on Saturday before disappearing.
