Associated Press

CALI, Colombia, Sept. 17 –– Gunmen kidnapped at least 30 people today from two restaurants located outside Colombia's third-largest city in an operation blamed
on leftist rebels.

About 50 armed men, many wearing military-style uniforms and bulletproof vests, barged into the restaurants in the highlands outside Cali on Sunday, police said.
Gunmen also seized a couple from a nearby farm.

The mass kidnapping recalled the abduction on May 30, 1999, by the National Liberation Army, or ELN, of 150 worshipers at a Catholic Mass in Cali. All those
hostages have since been released.

"We estimate that about 30 people were taken," said Cali police commander Rafael Pardo. Other police officials put the number of hostages between 25 and 40.

The hostages were snatched from the Cabana Restaurant and the Embajada de Ginebra restaurant, 10 miles outside Cali.

There were no immediate demands for ransom or claims of responsibility.

Eduardo de Lima and his wife Elena were kidnapped from a nearby farm. De Lima's brother owns the De Lima Insurance Company, one of the region's largest,
police said. Elena de Lima is a U.S. citizen from Timonium, Md., according to a relative living in the United States.