Kidnapped Colombian minister found dead
The body of Consuelo Araújo, the former Colombian culture minister who was kidnapped by the Colombian Revolutionary Armed Forces' leftist guerrilla group (Farc) last week, was found yesterday in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta in the north of the country. Mrs Araújo, who was married to Colombian procurator-general Edgardo Maya, had been shot twice. Twenty-five civilians who had been held captive by Farc were earlier released unharmed.
Peru's academics march for better pay
Peruvian academics demonstrated outside the parliament in Lima on Saturday in protest at the government's refusal to award them the same salaries as magistrates, in accordance with national law. The lecturers, who are also pressing for free higher education at Peru's public universities, demanded an immediate halt to human rights violations and other injustices suffered by academics during the last ten years of dictatorship.