Colombian Minister shot dead

Press, 3 May 1984, Page 10

Colombian Minister shot dead

NZPA-Reuter Bogota Colombian officials said yesterday that they believed the assassins of the Justice Minister, Dr Rodrigo Lara Bonilla, an anti-drug trafficking campaigner, had been hired in Medellin, capital of Antioquia department. Dr Lara was shot 11 times outside his home early yesterday. One of his assailants, who has a record of armed assault, was killed by bodyguards while the other, the driver of the motor-cycle used in the attack, is in hospital. A Government spokesman said that the two were hired killers but it was not known who had placed the contract on the Minister’s life. A judge would be appointed to investigate the killing. Dr Lara, who was 39, had led a campaign against Colombia’s booming drug

trade since taking office 18 months ago. He had received many death threats. In a response to the assassination the President, Dr Belisario Betancur, imposed a state of siege. “We are going to wage war on drug traffickers. The Government of Colombia accepts their challenge,” Dr Betancur said in a dramatic television address yesterday. The Interior Minister, Mr Alfonso Gomez Gomez, announced after an emergency Cabinet meeting that a state of siege declared in four departments recently was being immediately extended to the whole country. The measure gives security forces wide powers of search and arrest, restricts public meetings, and prohibits possession of weapons.

Mr Gomez Gomez said that the state of siege had been made necessary by a spate of guerrilla attacks

and the killing of Dr Lara. It was originally imposed on four south-west departments in March after guerrillas attacked the town of Florencia in apparent retaliation for a police swoop on a big cocaine factory. The swoop yielded 10 to 12 tonnes of cocaine — the biggest in the world, said the United States Ambassador, Mr Lewis Tambs. The Defence Minister, MajorGeneral Gustavo Matamoros, later said that the factory had been guarded by “druguerrillas,” who received money and arms in return for providing protection. Narcotics experts ssay that Colombia, where cocaine paste from Bolivia and Peru is processed in jungle factories, has become the drug’s main export centre.