A-Infos Rebels Free More than 300 from Colombian Prison

[Tom Burghardt <tburghardt@igc.apc.org>]

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        REBELS FREE MORE THAN 300 FROM COLOMBIA PRISON
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     06:56 p.m May 24, 1998 Eastern
 
     BOGOTA, May 24 (Reuters) - A 200-strong rebel force freed
more than 320 convicts by storming a prison in what was believed
to be Colombia's biggest ever breakout, authorities said on
Sunday.
   
     Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) rebels blew up
the walls of San Isidro prison on the outskirts of the city of
Popayan in the southwest and in a hail of gunfire poured into the
main compound just before midnight on Saturday.
   
     They killed two guards and two inmates and freed at least
326 prisoners, police said. Prison officials said it was the
country's largest breakout but had no immediate details of the
previous record.
   
     At least 46 escapees were recaptured by Sunday afternoon. A
huge police and army hunt was launched across Cauca province for
the rest, including convicted guerrillas and other ``high risk''
prisoners.
   
     The rebel-led mass escape was the latest in a string of
incidents that have highlighted flawed security, chronic
overcrowding and rampant violence in Colombia's 168 prisons.
   
     ``The situation is extremely difficult. We're just counting
the number of escapees right now,'' an official at San Isidro
prison told Reuters by telephone.
   
     ``We don't even know exactly who has escaped as yet. We've
counted 326 missing so far,'' he added, saying that 975 prisoners
had been housed in San Isidro before the breakout.
   
     Cesar Negrete, governor of Cauca province, said jailed FARC
rebels, led by a man known only by his nom de guerre as ``The
Red,'' had helped coordinate the prison attack from the inside.
   
     ``The jail was in very poor condition. The guerrillas
surrounded it and used dynamite. The guards only had pistols but
the guerrillas arrived with assault weapons,'' Negrete told
reporters.
   
     ``The problem was caused by overcrowding and the fact that
high risk prisoners and subversives were mixed with other
inmates.''
   
     The breakout took place two days after 20 prisoners tunneled
out of Bogota's Modelo high security jail and fled through the
sewer system. Marxist rebels and the former hired gunmen of
Colombia's top emerald magnate, Victor Carranza, were thought to
be among the convicts missing in the capital.
   
     Last month, FARC guerrillas attacked a prison in Santander
de Quilichao, also in Cauca province, freeing 54 prisoners. In
Bogota's other top security prison, La Picota, 14 inmates were
killed in a vigilante-style attack by fellow convicts.
   
     Authorities blame many of the problems in Colombia's prison
system on chronic overcrowding. The country's prisons were
intended to house 28,000 inmates but currently have more than
41,000, according to the National Prisons Institute (INPEC).
 
     Copyright 1998 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.
 
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