A Medill alumna is one of two freelance journalists on assignment for the Los Angeles Times who are being held captive in war-torn Colombia, Medill officials learned Tuesday.
Ruth Morris, Medill ’95, and photographer Scott Dalton disappeared Jan. 21 after being detained at a rebel roadblock between the towns of Saravena and Tame in northeast Colombia.
The pair’s taxi driver, Madiel Ariza, told the Los Angeles Times that members of the National Liberation Army, known by its Spanish initials ELN, said Morris and Dalton were being taken to meet with a high-ranking ELN official. The group claimed responsibility for the journalists’ capture in a radio broadcast last Thursday.
Reuters reported Tuesday that an ELN commander told a local radio station the pair was in good health and would be released in the next few days.
Medill School of Journalism Dean Loren Ghiglione said he spoke to Los Angeles Times Editor John Carroll and hopes to keep students and professors updated.
“We’re tremendously concerned about her, as a school, and we’ll try to keep everybody informed in the Medill community,” Ghiglione said.
In addition to posting a story about Morris’ abduction on the Medill Web site, Ghiglione said the school likely will broadcast information, including tapes of Morris’ broadcast stories, on plasma television screens in the McCormick Tribune Center lobby.
The area where Morris and Dalton were captured is a political hot spot in Colombia’s nearly 40-year civil war. A week before the abduction, 70 U.S. Special Forces troops arrived in the Arauca region to train Colombian troops, who will defend an oil pipeline that has been the frequent target of rebel attacks.
Jon Ziomek, director of Medill’s graduate programs, told students in Prof. David Nelson’s newswriting class that Morris, a British national who grew up in California, wanted to use her Spanish language skills in her career after she left NU. She had been in Colombia since at least 1999.
“We are all very worried about her,” Ziomek said.
Ghiglione said he believes specific preparation is necessary for journalists who want to work abroad.
“Certainly it’s a subject that becomes a real-life teaching tool for all of us that are encouraging students to study abroad,” he said. “We are sensitive to the responsibility that we have if students are going abroad. We need to prepare them.”
NU currently has no study abroad or affiliated programs in Colombia.
Reuters contributed to this report.
