Colombia leads search for U.S. plane crash survivors
Three Americans believed held by FARC guerrillas
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The bodies of two passengers were found shot near the wreckage of their crashed plane.
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BOGOTA, Colombia (CNN) -- A force of 2,000 Colombian soldiers combed a guerrilla stronghold in the southern part of the country Sunday in an attempt to find three U.S. citizens believed to have been taken prisoner by leftist guerrillas after their plane crashed last week.
U.S. planes, including AWACS, flew overhead to help direct the search for the three men, who were among five people -- four Americans and a Colombian -- aboard a U.S. government plane when it crashed Thursday.
Intercepted radio transmissions from the rebels confirm that members of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, known by their Spanish acronym FARC, are holding the three men, said Commandant Jorge Mora Rangel of Colombia's armed forces.
All five had been aboard a Cessna 208, contracted by the U.S. Defense Department, when it suffered mechanical problems and crashed deep in rebel-held territory, officials with the U.S. Southern Command said.
The Colombian army said rescuers reached the site within half an hour of the crash, and found the executed bodies of the other two men -- the Colombian and one of the Americans -- near the incinerated plane.
They were identified as Dennis Thomas, an American working under contract to the U.S. Embassy in Bogota, who was shot once in the neck; and Jose Cruz, a member of the Colombian army, who was shot once in the chest, said a spokesman for Colombia's attorney general.
The group had been on an intelligence mission en route from the capital to Florencia, in Colombia's Caqueta Department, a region known to harbor FARC guerrillas, the Colombian armed forces said.
-- Journalist Fernando Ramos contributed to this report
