COLOMBIA, DEA SMASH DRUG RING

BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) -- Colombian police and the U.S. Drug Enforcement
Administration said yesterday they have arrested 49 people and dismantled a
major international cocaine and heroin smuggling network.

The Medellin-based organization shipped 13.5 tons of cocaine and heroin to
the United States, authorities said, calling the group an example of a "new
generation" of low-profile traffickers who have replaced Colombia's former
drug cartels.

Colombia's deputy chief prosecutor, Jaime Cordoba, saluted the DEA for
providing critical intelligence and coordinating the two-year
investigation. Officials said the suspects belonged to a network of four
organizations coordinated by a 40-year-old Medellin-based trafficker,
Carlos Mario Castro Arias.

It sent at least a ton of cocaine a month from Colombia to the United
States by way of Mexico, often using fishing boats and concealing the drugs
in plastic molds, textiles and heavy machinery, police said.