The Colombian government extradited for trial in the United States Ricardo Palmera, also called Simon Trinidad, a former peace negotiator for the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC.  The Colombian and U.S. governments thus give this representative of the guerilla warfare and kidnapping operation the opposite treatment they give Salvatore Mancuso, commander of the murdering, massacring, and drug-running AUC, which Sean Donahue writes so well of above.

Colombian president Alvaro Uribe had said he would extradite Palmero if FARC did not free 63 hostages.  The nut graph (most important, explanatory paragraph) reads:

Analysts said Uribe's ultimatum to the FARC was unrealistic and part of an effort by the president to deflect criticism over his uncompromising attitude toward the rebels even as he shows leniency toward right-wing paramilitary militias, which are pursuing peace talks.

That paragraph, the 15th, came close to the end of the Associated Press article, on-line at the Toronto Globe & Mail.  This paragraph gets the closest to acknowledging the special treatment given the government-linked AUC, described by Donahue.

In the eighth paragraph the article noted the way to get the 63 hostages released: FARC says "it will only free the hostages in exchange for 500 jailed rebels."  The eleventh paragraph:

The hostages' families and the Roman Catholic Church, both of whom opposed Palmera's extradition, warned the move could complicate any future peace talks and scuttle efforts to negotiate a prisoner swap, endangering the hostages' lives.

These hostages are identified as "including three Americans" in AP's first paragraph.  The sixth 'graph identifies them as "three U.S. Defense Department contractors."

Similarly, the AP article initially referred to Palmera as a top leftist rebel, and later acknowledged him as a FARC peace negotiator.  Arrested in Ecuador, one report says he had gone there for medical treatment.  Before this extradition to the United States, Palmera had already been sentenced to 35 years by the Colombian government for "aggravated kidnapping."

In a published interview earlier this month, Palmera said he was innocent and was framed by U.S. agents. "The Colombian government believed they could dampen my revolutionary zeal with extradition, but this will never happen," he said.

Two separate grand jury indictments in the U.S. accuse Palmera of drug trafficking and giving material support and resources to terrorists, Reuters reported (in an otherwise uninformative article which mostly describes the Palmera's police escort).

"A former banker from a wealthy northern family who says he took up arms to fight social injustice, Palmera is one of the best-known members of the FARC," the Associated Press wrote.

While still lacking in some context, elaborating on the "leniency toward right-wing paramilitary militias," the AP story is a pretty good article if you read the whole thing.  But how many U.S. newspapers carry the whole thing?  (None that are listed on Google, nor the New York Times, which ran four paragraphs.  The Indianapolis Star's short version of the article credits Kim Housego, who may also be the uncredited author of the longer piece.)  The 'Marxist terrorist extradited' radio and television versions of this story can be imagined.  Equally important, what has any establishment media source done, with earlier articles, to set the context: the United States' use of drugs and terrorism as excuses to fund the U.S. colonial government side of Colombia's civil war?

For the facts in context – the truth and the consequences – read Narco News (and support the Fund that supports it).  And, if you run across news like this (or have direct knowledge, or the opportunity to investigate), please write about it and post to the NarcoSphere.  (If you don't have a co-publisher's account yet, writing a good news story qualifies you for an account.  E-mail me or one of the people who can actually offer that stuff around here: publisher Al Giordano or managing editor Dan Feder.