By Karl Penhaul

BOGOTA, Nov 27 (Reuters) Colombian President Ernesto Samper warned on
Thursday no country in the world could escape their institutions possibly
being compromised by the power of drugs. Samper's warning was made as
Russian Foreign Minister Yevgeny Primakov wrapped up a twoday visit to
Colombia.

A recent survey by U.S. magazine Newsweek ranked Colombia and Russia as two
of the countries worst affected by organized crime. Both feature among the
world's most corrupt nations in top business surveys.

``There's no country in the world that escapes the possibility of seeing
its institutions compromised by the power of drugs,'' Samper told a group
of Russian journalists in the ornate Casa de Narino presidential palace as
Primakov watched.

Opponents say the power of Colombia's drug mobs extended to Samper himself
and charge the notorious Cali cartel bankrolled part of his 1994 election
campaign with multimillion dollar donations.

Russian diplomats say more than 50 tonnes of Colombian cocaine have been
seized in Russia since 1996 and concede that is just ``a small part of the
total'' entering the country.

Colombia's notoriously powerful drug mobs have increasingly focused their
attention on the former Eastern bloc following the fall of the Berlin Wall
and have forged close ties with the mighty Russian mafia, according to
intelligence services.

During his twoday visit, the first by a Russian foreign minister to
Colombia, Primakov formalized a bilateral agreement, originally announced
last month, to combat what he described as the ``global evil'' of
narcotrafficking.

He gave few firm details of the accord but said a group of Russian special
agents, including some former KGB members, might soon be based in Colombia.

It is understood they would work in an advisory rather than frontline
capacity and provide information to Colombian counterparts on ties between
Russian crime mobs and Colombian cartels.

``Unfortunately with the inevitable process of Russia's transformation
toward a market economy there were certain negative effects ... in
particular organized crime and drug trafficking,'' Primakov told
congressmen in a morning meeting.

Primakov said Russia was ready to help Colombia look for a political
solution to its threedecadeold guerrilla war but insisted it would be a
facilitator rathern than powerbroker.

Many top cadres of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, the
country's largest rebel army, studied in the Soviet Union during the Cold
War years.