(Adds government reaction in paragraph six) By Hugh Bronstein BOGOTA, July 24 (Reuters) - The Colombian government may be using foreign mercenaries to try to rescue hostages, including French-Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt, held by leftist rebels, the country's biggest guerrilla group said. A month after 11 provincial lawmakers were killed in what the rebels called a botched rescue attempt by an unidentified military force, a top guerrilla commander said there were "indications" of multinational mercenary units in Colombia. "There are a lot of rumors of commando units including American, British and Israeli mercenaries penetrating the jungle and looking for ways to brings down the FARC," Raul Reyes of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) told Caracas-based TeleSUR television late on Monday. He said the mercenaries were trying to rescue FARC kidnap victims and achieve what Reyes called other "criminal" objectives. "This is obviously being ordered by (President) Alvaro Uribe," Reyes said. "It is a possibility that is out there, which is why we call them unidentified forces." A government official, speaking anonymously, told Reuters there have never been mercenaries in Colombia and called on the FARC to hand over the bodies of the 11 lawmakers so the circumstances of their deaths can be determined. Days earlier, Reyes said state and "para-state" forces participated in the June 18 rescue attempt in which the politicians died. Analysts say the killings may have been prompted by an incursion of illegal paramilitary forces into the area where captives were being held. Uribe, who says the army attempted no rescue and accuses the rebels of murdering the 11 hostages, is popular for cutting crime and attracting foreign investment as part of his U.S.-backed crackdown on the decades-old insurgency. "The FARC is feeling the heat from Uribe's successful security strategy and they know their image was hurt by the deaths of the lawmakers last month," said Pablo Casas, an analyst with Bogota think tank Security and Democracy. "So they are trying to bring other possible actors into the story in order to distract attention from the fact that they were responsible for the lives of these hostages." The rebels seized the 11 lawmakers in 2002 by pretending to be soldiers and escorting them out of a government building in Cali and onto a bus, saying there was a bomb scare. Betancourt was captured the same year while running for Colombia's presidency. The FARC is also holding three American defense contractors taken in 2003 during an anti-drug mission. (Additional reporting by Luis Jaime Acosta)
