FARC dissidents say they kidnapped French Foreign Legion member in Nariño

FARC dissidents say they are holding José Ólger Melo Charry, a Colombian corporal who serves in France’s Foreign Legion, after his disappearance in rural Nariño.

The Franco Benavides front made the claim in a document addressed to French authorities, Melo Charry’s family and his friends. It said the corporal was alive and that his physical safety was guaranteed as long as no hostile military operations took place in the area.

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His physical safety is fully guaranteed as long as no hostile military operations are carried out in the area.

Melo Charry had arrived in Pasto on Aug. 5. The following day, he was traveling with a woman toward Cumbitara when armed members of the group allegedly stopped the vehicle at an illegal roadblock and took him away. His whereabouts remain unknown.

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Any attempt at a military rescue operation would put the life of the person we call a prisoner of war at risk.

The corporal comes from Nariño but lives abroad. He had apparently returned to Colombia to visit family and friends in Pasto and in the western mountain region of the department.

The dissidents warned that any military rescue attempt would endanger him and said they would respond to any military action. They referred to him as a “prisoner of war.” Nariño Governor Luis Alfonso Escobar had earlier said he had not received official notification of the disappearance. He described information provided by the family to the Army as preliminary accounts requiring further intelligence assessment. The report also said the Army had issued its own account through the commander of the Military Gaula group in Nariño, Colonel Mauricio Osorio Villada, before the dissidents’ document became known.

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He had arrived from France without telling anyone and went to El Remolino.