PARIS, Feb. 14 (UPI) -- A senior Colombian official has criticized France for bungling efforts to free Ingrid Betancourt, four years after she was taken hostage by FARC guerrillas.
"The French government has multiplied its errors in the Betancourt affair," the official said in remarks published in France's Le Figaro newspaper Tuesday.
"If it had reacted as it did for the French hostages in Iraq, your compatriot would already be freed," the official added.
Over the last two years, Iraqi extremists have taken hostage three French reporters and an engineer. All have subsequently been released.
The daughter of a former Colombian diplomat based in Paris, Betancourt was kidnapped in February 2002 as she ran as a leftist candidate for the country's presidential election.
Betancourt's onetime political science professor, Dominique de Villepin, made the campaign to secure her release a top item in his agenda as France's former foreign minister.
De Villepin is now the French Prime Minister.
But relations between Paris and Bogotá have degraded since 2003 -- one factor complicating efforts to secure Betancourt's release, according to officials cited by Le Figaro.
Currently, Betancourt remains the FARC's most high-profile hostage.
Meanwhile, the body of a less-known French-Colombian hostage, Aida Duvaltier, was found Sunday. Duvaltier was seized by the separate Maoist Popular Liberation Army in 2001.
