Journalists Killed at Ecuador, Colombia Border

Ecuador’s President Lenin Moreno on Friday confirmed that three press workers kidnapped along the conflictive border with Colombia had been killed, opening the door to a military strike against their captors. Moreno spoke after a 12-hour deadline ended with the captors failing to demonstrate the hostages were still alive, AP reported. “Despite our best efforts, we’ve confirmed that these criminals never had the intention of handing them back safe and sound,” Moreno said. He said elite troops would soon be deployed to the northern border area where the employees of El Comercio newspaper were last seen nearly three weeks ago while investigating a rise in drug-fueled violence. Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos dispatched his top military advisers to Quito to assist in the military planning. Moreno also offered a $100,000 reward for information leading to the capture of Walter Arizala, better known by his alias Guacho, the leader of a holdout group of guerrillas from the demobilized Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia that claimed responsibility for the kidnapping.