Colombia orders arrests in slaying of unionists

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.tmcnet.com/usubmit/2007/09/23/2959489.htm

(EFE News Service Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge) Colombia's Attorney General's Office ordered the arrest of two suspects in the March 2001 murders of a pair of unionists who represented employees of U.S. multinational coal company Drummond, judicial officials said.

The arrest orders were issued Friday for presumed members of the AUC paramilitary federation Oscar Jose Ospino and Jairo de Jesus Charris.

According to the officials, "documentary evidence, testimonies and statements" exist to back up the decision to have the men arrested on charges of first-degree murder.

On March 12, 2001, union president Valmore Locarno and Victor Hugo Orcasita were riding in a Drummond bus carrying some 50 workers when it was intercepted by a group of armed men near the northern Colombian town of Bosconia.

The paramilitaries removed Locarno and Orcasita from the vehicle by force, shot the former to death and took his companion with them to torture and kill later. Antother union leader, Gustavo Soler, who was also riding on the bus and subsequently replaced Locarno as president of the union, was murdered seven months later.

According to the investigation, Ospino was the head of a group of the AUC paramilitary federation that was active in that region.

FULL story at link.