EUROPEAN ROLE NEEDED FOR COLOMBIA PEACE, SAYS U.N. OFFICIAL

MADRID (Reuters) -- International officials called Thursday for a bigger
European role in efforts to bring peace to Colombia after decades of
struggle against drug lords and Marxist rebels.

"It's time for Europe to wake up," Jan Egeland, special adviser to U.N.
Secretary-General Kofi Annan, said on the eve of a one-day conference on
Colombia to be attended in Madrid by European Union members and
international aid agencies.

Inter-American Development Bank chief Enrique Iglesias said European
countries needed to participate in the Colombian peace process in the same
way they helped resolve conflicts in Central America.

"I believe a European presence is important," he said.

Egeland and Iglesias were speaking at a seminar ahead of Friday's meeting,
which will discuss contributing to President Andres Pastrana's $7.5 billion
"Plan Colombia" aimed at stemming drug trafficking and funding an eventual
peace deal with the FARC rebel force.

Diplomatic sources in Latin America have said the Europeans are unlikely to
come up with the $1 billion in so-called social aid the Colombian president
has requested because they are opposed to the U.S.-funded military
component of Plan Colombia.

Congress late last month finalized a $1.3 billion package mostly in
military aid and hardware for Colombia.

Iglesias said the Madrid conference was not meant to debate the Plan
Colombia but to discuss the future funding of "social projects" to rebuild
Colombian society.

"No one should fool themselves into thinking that peace is merely the
silence of arms," he said. "It is also the achievement of true long-term
economic and social development, with justice as a central component."