URIBE UPROOTS COCA PLANTS

BOGOTA -- President Alvaro Uribe, clad in a tropical guaya-bera shirt,
uprooted coca plants alongside workers Monday while visiting a massive
eradication effort in a national park.

Last week, 930 government-hired peasants, protected by some 3,000
troops, descended on Sierra Macarena National Park, 170 kilometers
(105 miles) south of Bogota, manually pull up coca -- the key
ingredient in cocaine -- from some 4,500 hectares (11,000 acres) of
land.

The manual eradication effort is the biggest in the country's history,
a complex military and logistical mission that is expected to last up
to four months.

It was announced in December following the killing of 29 soldiers by
rebels belonging to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or
FARC, which has long used the Maca-rena preserve as a base for
narcotics activities.

Aerial fumigation has been seen widespread use in much of Colombia to
kill coca plants, but the government has refused so far to spray
herbicides in national parks due to environmental concerns. Many coca
operations have sought refuge in the parks.

Joining workers in a traditional Colombian lunch of beans and rice,
President Uribe pro-mised the manual eradication of a record 40,000
hectares (100,000 acres) of coca this year, the bulk in Macarena and
in areas along the Ecuadorean border. "It's urgent that we eliminate
coca fields from all national parks just as we are now doing here in
Macarena," said Uribe.