Three contractors were kidnapped February 13

BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) --Eleven rebels have been killed in an ongoing military
operation to find three U.S. contractors taken hostage by rebels three months ago, a U.S.
official said.

But authorities from Colombia and the United States, which is assisting in the
search operation, say they know very little about the fate of the three men, who
were kidnapped February 13 when their U.S. government plane went down in
the mountainous jungles of southern Colombia. The Revolutionary Armed
Forces of Colombia, or FARC, has admitted capturing the three men.

"We don't know where they are. We don't know exactly which group of the
FARC is holding them. And so, we have not made a great deal of progress in
securing their release," U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell told a
congressional hearing Thursday.

The United States has sent 49 soldiers to assist in the search effort, providing
intelligence information to some 2,000 Colombian soldiers combing the sparsely
populated region, which is tightly controlled by the FARC.

Powell acknowledged that the new troops bring the number of U.S. military
personnel in Colombia to above 400. Congress capped the number of troops in
Colombia at 400, but allowed the administration to exceed that number in cases
such as kidnappings.

Powell told the foreign operations subcommittee of the House appropriations
committee that the kidnappings would not change administration policy in the
region.

"It's sad that it happened, but it is a risk that we must run in order to try to
defeat terrorists and these narco-traffickers and to help President (Alvaro)
Uribe," he said.

FARC: Americans are 'prisoners of war'

The U.S. troops are not engaged in direct combat roles.

"Ninety-nine percent of this effort is being done by the Colombian army," said
Curt Struble, the acting U.S. assistant secretary of state for the Western
Hemisphere.

Struble, in Bogota Wednesday for a regional security meeting, said that 11
rebels had died in the operations.

The FARC is calling the three Americans "prisoners of war" and has warned
that the operations could put their lives in danger. Rebel hostages are often
killed when security forces try to rescue them.

The three were conducting intelligence operations when their plane suffered
engine trouble. The FARC has claimed that rebels shot the single-engine
Cessna down, though U.S. and Colombian officials deny that.

The three Americans are the first U.S. government employees captured by
rebels in more than two decades.

A fourth American and a Colombian army sergeant also on the plane were shot
and killed near the scene of the crash.

The FARC considers U.S. help in Colombia's battle against rebels and drug
trafficking an act of war and has warned in the past that U.S. citizens would be
targeted.

Leftist rebels are battling the government and an outlawed paramilitary group in
Colombia's long-running civil war.

Copyright 2003 The Associated Press.