Word: betancur
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When Ronald Reagan first met Colombian President Belisario Betancur Cuartas, 62, during a five-day tour of Latin America more than two years ago, the U.S. President had been forewarned of the Colombian's reputation for candor. Betancur lived up to his advance billing. He criticized Reagan publicly for the U.S.'s approach to Central American problems and complained of "frustrations and irreparable damage" in developing countries caused by U.S. economic policies...
...months later, in the streets of Bogota, two young hit men on a red Yamaha motorcycle pulled up alongside Lara's white Mercedes-Benz and pumped seven bullets into the 38-year-old minister. The killing electrified Colombia and enraged its government. "We've had enough," said President Belisario Betancur Cuartas, trembling with anger during his elegy to the slain minister. With that, Betancur declared a "war without quarter" on Colombia's kings of cocaine...
Last year, however, the traffickers' seamless system was disrupted when President Betancur declared a state of siege under which suspects could be arrested in Colombia without warrant. Betancur also revived extradition, which he had previously opposed on philosophical grounds. Signaling his determination to pursue even the most powerful of traffickers, he promptly signed an agreement with Washington for the extradition of Cocaine Kingpin Carlos Enrique Lehder Rivas, an ultrarightist who is wanted for a host of drug-related crimes in the U.S. In all, Washington has requested the arrests of 85 Colombians for drug-connected offenses...
...Although Betancur's assault caused the drug kings to lie low for a while, they were by no means cowed. Within a month of the Lara murder, Entrepreneur Escobar and a few colleagues, claiming to represent a group of coqueros controlling 80% of the drug market, met first with Alfonso Lopez Michelsen, a former Colombian President, and then with Attorney General Carlos Jimenez Gomez in Panama City to offer the Colombian government a deal: in exchange for total amnesty, they said, they would dismantle their illicit empires and repatriate $5 billion into Colombia's troubled economy. The government replied ; that...
...force personnel and 200 national policemen have reportedly been discharged because of drug connections; last year Attorney General Jimenez ordered investigations of 400 judges suspected of complicity in the trade. A particularly damaging cocaine link was revealed earlier this month when Roman Medina, the personal press secretary of President Betancur, was arrested on suspicion of helping smuggle 2.7 kilos of cocaine into Spain in two diplomatic pouches...