Ingrid Betancourt has been reunited with her children - a day after being freed from more than six years of captivity in the Colombian jungle.

The French-Colombian politician was among 15 hostages rescued without a shot being fired as their rebel captors were tricked into handing them over.

Her children travelled to Bogota from France for the emotional reunion.

Ms Betancourt said she would now work tirelessly for the freedom of all hostages being held by Farc rebels.

"It is most important that every Colombian feels that we will free them - that our brothers in the jungle will return," she said.

The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, which has been waging a war of independence for the past four decades, still holds more than 40 high-profile hostages, among up to 700 other captives.

A day after her release, Ms Betancourt raced up the steps of the aircraft to embrace her daughter, Melanie, and her son, Lorenzo Delloye-Betancourt, who had flown in from France.

Presidential hopes

Earlier, Ms Betancourt had hailed Wednesday's mission to free her and 14 fellow hostages as a "perfect operation".

Colombian soldiers, posing as members of a non-government organisation, had flown the hostages to freedom in a helicopter.

When the head of the operation told them that they were free, "the helicopter almost fell from the sky because we all jumped, shouted, cried and embraced", Ms Betancourt said.

Also released were three Americans and 11 members of the Colombian security forces, all said to be in relatively good health.

The Americans - military contractors Marc Gonsalves, Thomas Howes and Keith Stansell - have flown back to Texas, where they are expected to be reunited with their families and undergo medical tests.

Colombia's President Alvaro Uribe congratulated the army on the operation, and urged Farc to release its remaining hostages and seek peace.

Emerging with other hostages from a military plane in the Colombian capital, Bogota, a pale but smiling Ms Betancourt had thanked the Colombian president, whom she had been running against as a presidential candidate when she was kidnapped in a Farc-controlled area of southern Colombia in 2002.

"I continue to aspire to serve Colombia as president," she added.

On Friday Ms Betancourt is due to travel to France to meet President Nicolas Sarkozy, who had made ensuring her rescue a foreign policy priority.

Facing justice

Precise details of how the rescue operation unfolded remain sketchy, but Colombian Defence Minister Juan Manuel Santos said the Farc rebels had been tricked into handing over the hostages.

He said that soldiers had posed as members of a fictitious non-government organisation that supposedly would fly the captives to a camp to meet rebel leader Alfonso Cano.

"The helicopters, which in reality were from the army, picked up the hostages in Guaviare and flew them to freedom," he said.

The local commander in charge of the hostages, a man known as Cesar, had boarded the helicopter with another rebel.

Both had been quickly overpowered and would now face justice, he added.

The US ambassador to Colombia, William Brownfield, said there had been "close co-operation" from the Americans, including the sharing of intelligence, equipment and training advice.

The rescued Americans were captured after their light aircraft crashed in the Colombian jungle in 2003.

The 11 members of the Colombian security forces who were released had been captured in various rebel attacks.

World leaders welcomed the news, and celebrations erupted on the streets of Colombian cities as crowds hailed the jungle rescue in a country plagued for decades by kidnappings.

The BBC's Jeremy McDermott in Medellin says the successful operation by Colombian security forces is a political and military coup for the country's government.

He adds that it is a major blow to the Farc, which had hoped to exchange some 60 political hostages for hundreds of rebels held by the Colombian government, and has now lost a powerful negotiating tool with Ms Betancourt's rescue.

(BBC)

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