Pubdate: Fri, 01 Dec 2000
Source: Los Angeles Times (CA)
Copyright: 2000 Los Angeles Times
Contact:  Times Mirror Square, Los Angeles, CA 90053
Fax: (213) 237-7679
Website: http://www.latimes.com/
Forum: http://www.latimes.com/discuss/
Author: ANDREW SELSKY, Associated Press Writer

POLICE THWART COLOMBIA ATTACK PLAN

BOGOTA, Colombia--Police thwarted an apparent assassination attempt against 
a U.S. senator and U.S. ambassador who were visiting the most dangerous 
town in Colombia, a Colombian police commander said Friday.

Hours before Paul Wellstone, D-Minn., and U.S. Ambassador Anne Patterson 
flew into the town of Barrancabermeja on Thursday, police discovered two 
shrapnel-wrapped land mines alongside the road leading from the airport to 
the town and arrested a suspected rebel, said police Col. Jose Miguel Villar.

The land mines each carried a 6.6 -pound explosive charge, were attached to 
cables and a detonator and were ready to be set off, Villar said in a phone 
interview from Barrancabermeja, 155 miles north of Bogota, the capital.

Bernardo Alvarez Duarte, a suspected member of the rebel National 
Liberation Army, or ELN, was arrested at the site, Villar said.

"If the bomb had gone off, it could have caused immense damage," Villar 
said. "It would have spread shrapnel over a wide area and could have taken 
out 10 or 15 people."

Patterson said she had received sketchy reports about the bomb as the 
delegation departed Barrancabermeja.

Many residents of Barrancabermeja had known the U.S. delegation was going 
to arrive. But security forces had kept confidential plans to transfer the 
party from the airport to the town by helicopter. Even if the bombs had 
exploded, the delegation would not have gone anywhere near them.

Villar said the Americans were probably the target of the bomb, but could 
not absolutely confirm it. Alvarez, the arrested man, was being questioned 
for further information.

Washington supports the Colombian military in its fight against the ELN and 
a bigger rebel group, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC.

Barrancabermeja is the most violent town in Colombia, with almost 500 
politically related murders this year alone, according to human rights 
activists. Right-wing paramilitary squads and rebels have been preying on 
the townspeople and fighting for control of the region.

Wellstone, a second-term senator and a member of the foreign relations 
committee, arrived in Colombia on Tuesday night and was departing on 
Friday. He visited Barrancabermeja to lend support to human rights 
activists there.
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