Bogota's mayor says Colombian Sen. Miguel Uribe Turbay, a conservative presidential hopeful, is in serious condition following surgery for a gunshot wound at a political rally a day earlier.

Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt, who was held as a hostage for six years by Colombia’s largest guerrilla group, says she will be running for her country’s presidency.

The decision came to light Thursday in a report by Russ Dallen, the head of Caracas Capital Markets, which closely monitors litigation involving Venezuela. Attorneys for Lpez are now pinning their hopes on an emergency appeal filed Tuesday to Justice Sonia Sotomayor in accordance with Supreme Court rules. They were freed 12 years ago Thursday along with former Colombian presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt in a daring rescue by Colombias army. In 2012, a federal judge in Florida awarded the men $318 million to be paid from bank accounts seized from drug traffickers linked to the FARC, a designated terrorist group. Lpez is a powerful businessman in Venezuela whose fortune soared thanks to government contracts in the past two decades of socialist rule.