Nine oil workers who were kidnapped in the northeast of Colombia Tuesday have been liberated, authorities said Wednesday.
Defense Minister Juan Carlos Pinzon confirmed that the nine oil workers currently being kept in a military base in Arauca are the same who were kidnapped Tuesday.
The senior official praised the police, whose pressure and operations he said made the release possible.
As soon as the nine employees of oil company Consorcio Casanare Avanzada were reported missing security forces launched a search in the area.
The rescued men are Heriberto Mendoza Naranjo, Camilo Esteban Vega, Jose Javier Munoz, Daniel Munoz, Agustin Gonzalez Romero, Jose Carrillo Bernardino, Leon Simon Lizarazu, the driver Edgar Rojas and his assistant Ojeda.
The abduction had come only days after the country’s biggest rebel group FARC, one of the illegal armed groups in the Arauca region, announced that it would stop kidnapping civilians. The ELN, Colombia‘s second largest rebel group, is also highly active in the region.