PARIS, Sept 3, 2007 (AFP) - France Monday hailed the efforts of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to secure the release of 45 hostages held by the Colombian rebel group FARC, including the French-Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt.

'We salute the efforts of President Chavez to help conclude a humanitarian accord,' said foreign ministry spokeswoman Pascale Andreani. 'We urge the FARC to make the necessary moves to allow the hostages in Colombia to be released without delay.'

PARIS, Aug 16, 2007 (AFP) - The children of French-Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt appealed on Thursday to rebels holding their mother to give them solid proof she is still alive after 2,000 days in captivity.

'All we have been asking for the past four years is some proof of life. For us to have real proof, video proof that she is alive,' Betancourt's son Lorenzo Delloye, 19, told reporters in Paris.

BOGOTA, Aug 14, 2007 (AFP) - French-Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt, who sees her 2,000th day as a hostage Thursday, is famous in France for her ordeal -- but in her home country split by civil conflict she is just one of thousands held by rebels.

There has been no sign of the 45-year-old since a video released in 2003, the year after she was seized near rebel territory while waging an ambitious campaign as a green party presidential candidate, denouncing corruption.

TRIPOLI, July 26, 2007 (AFP) - France recently sent a mission to Colombia to try to secure the release of the Franco-Colombian hostage Ingrid Betancourt, President Nicolas Sarkozy said during a visit to Libya.

'We sent people to negotiate, two people,' the French president told reporters late Wednesday on the sidelines of his talks with Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi.