Betancourt’s Unsung Hero

Since the dramatic rescue last week of 15 hostages held by Colombia’s leftist rebel movement the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or Farc, much of this country’s attention - if not the world’s - has been focused on Ingrid Betancourt.

Finally though one of France’s leading national daily newspapers, Le Figaro, has caught up with reports that have appeared elsewhere around the globe.

In today’s issue it carries the story of the man without whom we would probably not have been able to share in Betancourt’s joy as she stepped out of the ‘plane on to the tarmac and into the lenses of countless cameras last week.

William Perez is the man Betancourt has herself described since her release as her “guardian angel.” He was the one who fed her like a child when she was going through the darkest of her dark days during more than six years in captivity.

When Betancourt gave up the will to live and refused to eat saying she wanted to die, it was Perez who urged her to remain strong, who spoon fed her, who constantly reminded her she had to stay alive with “a spoonful for her daughter M