Uribe on Friday ordered the military to hunt for the four, who have been held by leftist guerrillas for some years, after an escaped hostage said he saw them just weeks ago.

“We are verifying what Mr. Uribe has said exactly,” a spokesman for French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said on France Info radio.

“We are against any military action that could endanger the lives of the hostages.”

One of the hostages is Ingrid Betancourt, a former Colombian presidential candidate who also holds French nationality and whose plight is closely followed in France. Paris City Hall has erected a large poster of her outside the building.

Betancourt, born in Botoga, studied in France and obtained French nationality when she married a fellow student.

FARC guerrillas captured Betancourt and her assistant Clara Rojas in February 2002 while she was campaigning for president.

The Americans — Thomas Howes, Marc Gonsalves and Keith Stansell — were captured in 2003 after their surveillance plane crashed while spotting coca crops used to make cocaine.

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