Reuters/Bogota
Colombian police struck a blow against the country’s top drug cartel by capturing a trafficker accused of smuggling about 100 tonnes of cocaine to the US, officials said yesterday.
Juan Rivera was arrested in the city of Cali after a six-month manhunt. He is wanted for extradition by US courts in Florida and was second in command of the Norte del Valle cartel, Colombia’s biggest cocaine smuggling gang.
“With the passing of the years, Rivera became the key part of this organization in terms of smuggling cocaine to external markets,” said national police chief Oscar Naranjo.
Police believe Rivera, known in Colombia’s underworld at “Zero Six” is responsible for sending 98 tonnes of cocaine to the US alone.
Colombian rebels said on Sunday they will free two hostages in a unilateral gesture that could set the stage for a comprehensive exchange of prisoners held by both sides in the country’s 45-year-old guerrilla war.
Soldiers Pablo Moncayo and Josue Calvo are locked up in secret jungle camps by Colombia’s biggest guerrilla army, known as the FARC.
They and 22 other kidnapped members of the state security forces are being used as leverage by the Marxist rebels, who want to negotiate the freedom of hundreds of their fighters held in government jails.
“With this gesture of a unilateral release we reaffirm our willingness to advance in an exchange of all prisoners of war, whether they be held by the guerrillas or the state,” said a statement issued by the outlawed FARC.
The swap could be a step toward talks aimed at ending the war, the group said. But President Alvaro Uribe’s conservative government says the cocaine-financed guerrillas must lay down their arms and give up crime before peace talks can start.
Moncayo, snatched by the FARC in 1997, has become a symbol of the suffering of kidnap victims since his father Gustavo Moncayo began a campaign for his freedom, wrapping himself in chains and walking throughout Colombia.
Calvo was kidnapped earlier this year.
Opposition Senator Piedad Cordoba has been designated by Uribe to help mediate the release of the hostages, who at times appear stuck in a political tug of war between the leftist senator and the president.
Uribe, whose father was killed in a 1983 FARC kidnapping attempt, is popular for his U.S.-backed crackdown on the rebels. He may stand for a third term in 2010 if his supporters succeed in amending the constitution to allow him to run.
The decision to release the two soldiers was first announced by the FARC in April, but the plan got bogged down in disagreements with Uribe over the conditions for a hand-over.
The president agreed this month to FARC demands that it be allowed to free the 24 hostages one at a time rather than all at once, a reversal in policy that could speed releases.
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