Ransom bid raises hope for hostages in Bogota

A significant step toward freeing US Ambassador Diego Asencio and 17 other diplomatic hostages in the Dominican Embassy came with a bid to pay a ransom to the leftist guerrillas, diplomatic sources said. Two men, one of them identified as Jose Manuel Rivas, a Colombian foreign minister during the 1950s, Wednesday negotiated a financial payment to the guerrillas. The source of the money nor the outcome of the meetings were disclosed.