Colombia's missing set 10-year high

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BOGOTA, Feb. 12 (UPI) -- More than 7,500 Colombians disappeared in 2012, the highest number in 10 years, the country's coroner says.

The 7,530 missing people is a 76 percent increase from 2011, Colombia Reports said Monday.

The capital, Bogota, recorded the most missing people -- 3,235 -- in 2012, the coroner said in a report. Medellin, the country's second largest city, had 609.

Some 43 percent of the registered missing were women, the report said. Five years ago, women accounted for only 26 percent of the missing.

The report does not distinguish between those who are voluntarily missing and those who are forcibly disappeared.

More than 60,000 Colombians have disappeared over the past decades, the coroner said. Some human rights organizations claim about 250,000 people have disappeared since the start of the country's conflict with drug gangs.