Kidnapping in Colombia: The Role of Abductions in Decades-Long Conflict – Christian Science Monitor
Kidnapping in Colombia: The role of abductions in decades-long conflict.
Colombia's first comprehensive review of kidnapping during turbulent decades of violence finds that nearly 40,000 people were kidnapped between 1970 and 2010.
At the height of Colombia's conflict, kidnapping became so common that nearly everyone knew someone – or of someone – who had been abducted. Some people were held for days, others for years. Almost invariably, a ransom was demanded; in most cases it was paid.
In the first-ever comprehensive attempt to quantify the scourge, a new study found that at least 39,058 people were kidnapped between 1970 and 2010. Titled "The Kidnapped Truth," the study found that at least 301 people had been kidnapped more than once, and that one person was abducted five different times. (The study is available here in Spanish)
The figures represent only an approximation of the scope of the problem as "there is no way to know with certainty how many kidnap victims there were," according to the study...