BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) — Forty-five soldiers have been let go after being surrounded by hundreds of civilians who blocked them from leaving a village in a coca-growing region of southwestern Colombia, the country's army said Monday.

The army showed videos of some of the soldiers disembarking Monday from a helicopter with their backpacks and rifles as they returned to a military base in the city of Popayan. The soldiers were on an anti-narcotics mission when they were seized Sunday.

Authorities have not explained how the soldiers were freed after being trapped by about 600 villagers in a region under the influence of a rebel group and known for its coca leaf crops. In the past, military personnel taken captive by villagers in rural Colombia have been liberated via the intermediation of human rights groups.

Colombian authorities had described the incident in the municipality of El Tambo as a kidnapping. Defense Minister Pedro Sanchez, in a post on the social media platform X, vowed those responsible will face prosecution.

This is the fifth time this year that groups of soldiers in Colombia have been seized by civilians, who are sometimes armed and have been accused by authorities of acting on the orders of rebel groups.

The group of 45 soldiers freed Monday had been conducting an anti-narcotics mission in Micay Canyon, a bastion of FARC-EMC, a rebel faction that broke away from the former Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC.

Colombia has struggled to maintain security in some rural areas, where drug gangs and rebel groups are fighting over territory abandoned by the FARC, the guerrilla group that made peace with the government in 2016.

In August, 33 soldiers were taken captive, allegedly by villagers acting under the orders of a rebel group in the southern department of Guaviare. That followed a gunfight that killed 10 members of a FARC holdout group. The army said villagers holding the soldiers were demanding the return of a slain civilian's body, which was transported to a morgue in the provincial capital. The soldiers were released after four days.

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