Colombia Sends 13 Paramilitary Leaders to U.S.

The lack of cooperation did not go unnoticed in Washington. A May 2005 declassified U.S. government cable obtained by the National Security Archives, a nonprofit research group, and provided to The Washington Post, said Murillo, after joining peace talks, "subsequently began to stall negotiations and launched a campaign to project his influence in the political arena."

Another American document from August 2005 noted with concern how drug traffickers were "buying a seat" at government negotiations in order to take advantage of government concessions. In other 2005 documents, American officials wrote about how paramilitary groups were rearming as commanders recruited unemployed Colombians to fulfill demobilization quotas.

Victims' rights organizations had taken to protesting the process, and beleaguered prosecutors appeared incapable of uncovering the details of thousands of crimes.

The extraditions come as an expanding investigation of links between paramilitary groups and lawmakers has led to the arrests of more than 30 members of Congress. Thirty other lawmakers are under investigation.

While rights advocates voiced concern Tuesday that the extradited commanders would cease all cooperation on investigations into rights abuses, Uribe and U.S. officials said that the inquires would continue.

Among those who are skeptical of the claims is Yolanda Becerra, who heads a women's rights organization in a region of central Colombia that for years was hard hit by paramilitary death squads.

"There are so many victims, so many crimes, so much democracy that has been destroyed by these men," Becerra said by telephone from the city of Barrancabermeja. "What we the victims want to know is the truth: who financed them, who directed them, who ordered them."