4 July 2008

PARIS - Freed Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt said she had stared into the "abyss" during her six-year hostage ordeal as she headed to Paris for a meeting with President Nicolas Sarkozy on Friday.

Newly reunited with her son and daughter a day after her jungle rescue by the Colombian army, Betancourt, who has dual French-Colombian nationality, left Bogota late Thursday for France, where she was set for a hero's welcome.

Speaking to French radio before she boarded the plane, the 46-year-old former presidential candidate said she was chained up night and day for three years by her rebel captors, with only her Catholic faith as a solace.

"I was in chains all the time, 24 hours a day, for three years," she told Europe 1 radio. "I tried to wear those chains... with dignity, even if I felt that it was unbearable."

Freed on Wednesday along with three US hostages and 11 Colombians from the grip of Marxist FARC rebels in a bloodless operation by the Colombian army, Betancourt said she had suffered "moments of real crisis, hardship and abuse".

Asked whether she was tortured, she replied "Yes, yes". She said she saw her captors lapsing into "diabolical behaviour." "It was so monstrous that I think they themselves were disgusted."

"I think you need tremendous spirituality to stop yourself falling into the abyss," she said, adding that she decided in the helicopter flying her to safety not to reveal the most "sordid" details of her ordeal.

Betancourt Thursday had a powerfully emotional reunion at Bogota airport with her daughter Melanie, 22, and son Lorenzo, 19, who waged a relentless campaign for their mother's release, making her a cause celebre in France.

"I thank God for this moment. These are my little ones, my pride, my reason for living, my light, my moon, my stars, for them I wanted to leave the jungle, to see them again," she said.

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