5 Americans Among 10 Kidnapped in Amazon

Ten oil workers, including at least five Americans, were kidnapped from an Amazon jungle oil field in a hijacked helicopter on Thursday in an act that Ecuadorean officials blamed on Colombian guerrillas.

Ecuadorean Vice President Pedro Pinto charged that the predawn abduction, which occurred in a remote area of Ecuador near Colombia’s main coca-growing region, is rebel revenge for a $1.3-billion U.S. anti-drug package. The bulk of the money will go to Colombia, but Ecuador will receive a portion for projects such as improving the Manta air base where U.S. anti-narcotics spy planes land and are resupplied.

Pinto claimed that the kidnappers were members of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, Latin America’s largest Marxist insurgent group, which is financed mainly by ransom from abductions and “taxes” it imposes on coca, used to make cocaine.

Speaking to reporters in Colombia, the guerrillas denied responsibility for Thursday’s kidnapping.

In Bogota, the Colombian capital, Defense Minister Luis Fernando Ramirez said: “We can neither deny nor confirm that the FARC or Ecuadorean guerrillas participated. . . . We can neither deny nor confirm that the helicopter entered Colombian territory.”

A statement released by Ecuador’s armed forces said that the helicopter was seen crossing into Colombia after the abduction. Military officials have refused to elaborate on their brief statement, but it has been received skeptically by journalists who know the area.

“There are serious doubts that this could have occurred the way the government said it did,” noted Paco Velasco, director of Radio La Luna, Ecuador’s leading news radio station.

The abduction occurred nearly an hour’s helicopter ride away from the border region where the helicopter was later spotted, he said.

According to the statement, more than a dozen heavily armed men carried out the abduction, but only 18 people--including the victims--could fit in the helicopter. For that reason, the rest of the kidnappers must still be in the area, but police have not found them, Velasco said.

Further confusing matters, while the Ecuadoreans said that six of the victims are Americans, the U.S. State Department reported that one of the people initially believed to be an American is actually from New Zealand. Other victims were reported to be from Chile, Argentina and France.

Authorities in Ecuador at first blamed a kidnapping just over a year ago on another Colombian rebel group, but later acknowledged that the abductors were common criminals.

Colombian political analyst Alejo Vargas said that it was premature to attribute the kidnapping to the FARC. “The FARC [leaders] have said, and I believe them, that they won’t make military incursions into foreign territory,” he said.

The rebels have long used neighboring countries as rest and resupply areas, but usually have avoided trouble outside Colombian borders. FARC has denied responsibility for the kidnapping seven years ago of three American missionaries in Panama’s remote Darien jungle, near the Colombian border.

FARC leaders have warned that the U.S. aid, which includes helicopters and counter-narcotics training for the army, will escalate Colombia’s three-decade-long conflict. While that escalation will probably affect neighboring countries, Vargas said, the first impact is most likely to be a flood of refugees.

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Times staff writer Darling reported from San Salvador and special correspondent Morris from Cartagena.