Colombia’s ahead Luis Diaz reacts after lacking a penalty shot throughout the 2026 FIFA World Cup South American qualification soccer match between Ecuador and Colombia on the Rodrigo Paz Delgado Stadium in Quito, on October 17, 2023. (Picture by Rodrigo BUENDIA / AFP)
Greater than 120 Colombian troopers backed by police searched Sunday for the daddy of Liverpool winger Luis Diaz, kidnapped together with his spouse, who has since been rescued.
The military mentioned in an announcement it had arrange roadblocks and deployed two motorized platoons, unmanned plane, helicopters and a aircraft with radar within the seek for Luis Manuel Diaz.
Colombian authorities didn’t present particulars in regards to the kidnapping, however media reported the footballer’s father and mom Cilenis Marulanda had been taken Saturday by armed males on bikes at a gasoline station of their residence city of Barrancas within the northern La Guajira division.
President Gustavo Petro mentioned Marulanda was rescued in Barrancas hours after the couple was taken.
Lawyer Common Francisco Barbosa instructed a press convention Sunday that Diaz “may very well be” in Venezuela, with out elaborating.
The motive for the kidnapping has not been divulged.
“We’re determined, we’re distressed, we all know nothing about him,” Olmer Diaz, the kidnapped man’s brother, instructed AFP in Barrancas, urging his “immediate launch.”
Colombia is a rustic simply rising from many years of civil battle between rival armed teams that has seen greater than 38,000 folks kidnapped over time, principally for ransom.
Petro, at an occasion to mark the beginning of native elections in Bogota, mentioned “all the general public forces have been deployed” to seek out Diaz’s father.
Luis Manuel Diaz was an novice coach on the solely soccer college in Barrancas, a city of about 38,000 inhabitants close to the Venezuelan border, the place his son confirmed promise from a really younger age.
His father is credited with aiding the meteoric rise of the Liverpool and Colombia striker generally known as “Lucho.”
‘Worrying state of affairs’
Diaz, a 26-year-old Wayuu Indigenous man, has not spoken out in regards to the occasions.
In his Colombian hometown, resident Leonardo Diaz, 41 (no relation), instructed AFP he was “unhappy and dismayed” by the kidnapping of a person he described as “a humble particular person of the folks.”
The footballer’s Liverpool teammate, Portugal’s Diogo Jota, devoted his objective in a Premier League conflict Sunday towards Nottingham Forest to Diaz, who didn’t play.
In celebration, Jota ran to supervisor Jurgen Klopp, who handed him Diaz’s shirt, which he held aloft to applause from Liverpool followers.
Colombian police have provided a reward equal to about $48,000 for data that leads them to Diaz and his captors.
Liverpool FC issued an announcement Sunday saying it was “conscious of an ongoing state of affairs involving the household of Luis Diaz” in Colombia.
“It’s our fervent hope that the matter is resolved safely and on the earliest attainable alternative. Within the meantime, the participant’s welfare will proceed to be our instant precedence,” it mentioned.
Supervisor Klopp described it as a “worrying state of affairs for all of us.”
“We needed to clearly make a late change due to the non-public state of affairs involving Luis Diaz,” he mentioned forward of Sunday’s match.
“It was a fairly robust night time. I’ve by no means had that earlier than. It’s a brand new expertise I by no means wanted.”
Diaz is the primary Indigenous Colombian to make it to the highest echelons of world soccer.
He has performed for his nation 43 instances and arrived at Liverpool final yr from Portuguese membership Porto.
Your subscription couldn’t be saved. Please strive once more.
Your subscription has been profitable.
He has performed 11 video games with Liverpool and scored three objectives.