REBELS OR DRUG RINGS SUSPECTED IN COLOMBIAN PRELATE'S KILLING

CARACAS, Venezuela, March 17 - The killing of Archbishop Isaias
Duarte Cancino of Cali, Colombia, on Saturday night, after he
officiated over a group wedding in a poor neighborhood, stunned a
country already deep in conflict.

The outspoken Roman Catholic archbishop, who had often been critical
of the country's leftist rebels, was shot by two men as he headed to
his car outside a church in Cali.

Some Colombian law enforcement officials hinted that the rebels were
most likely responsible for Archbishop Duarte's death, while church
officials said narcotics traffickers might have killed him.

Archbishop Duarte had excommunicated the rebels for kidnapping
civilians and castigated drug-tainted candidates in last week's
congressional elections. He also injected himself into Colombia's
chaotic civil war, confirming that he had helped arrange secret
meetings between government officials and an outlawed rightist
paramilitary group responsible for thousands of killings.

The government offered a $430,000 reward for information leading to
to the killers, and thousands of people showed up at Cali's cathedral
to pay tribute.

Pope John Paul II, speaking at St. Peter's Square in Rome today,
called Archbishop Duarte a "generous and valiant pastor" who had
"paid the highest price for his defense of human life and his firm
opposition to all types of violence."

A United Nations spokeswoman in Bogota condemned the killing, saying
it formed "part of the deplorable series of violent acts perpetrated"
against Colombians by the country's violent groups.

The archbishop's delicate role as an intermediary was made public in
a best-selling book co-written by the leader of the paramilitary
group, Carlos Castano.

"It leaves me cold," the archbishop told The Dallas Morning News in
December about the disclosure of his role. "This puts people's lives
in danger, including my own. Truthfully? It makes me think of
leaving."

The assassination of Archbishop Duarte, the highest-ranking clergyman
ever killed in Colombia, brought back memories of the killing of El
Salvador's archbishop, Oscar Arnulfo Romero, by right-wing gunmen in
1980 and the slaying of a Mexican archbishop, Cardinal Juan Jesus
Posadas Ocampo, by drug traffickers in 1993.

It also underscored the increasing brutality that has marked
Colombia's conflict, which has heated up since President Andres
Pastrana broke off peace talks with the largest rebel group last
month.

About 40,000 people have died in the last decade in a complex, often
shadowy war in which paramilitary forces kill union organizers,
leftist politicians and poor villagers, while the rebels respond with
selective assassinations and brutal attacks on isolated police
outposts.

Archbishop Duarte seemed to know that his dealings with the
paramilitary group could be risky. In the early 1990's, when he was
bishop in the Uraba region of northern Colombia, he got to know Mr.
Castano. He also became close friends with Alvaro Uribe Velez, a
governor at the time, whose presidential candidacy has been gaining
support because of his hard-line approach toward the rebels.

The archbishop told the Dallas newspaper that he had set up meetings
between Mr. Castano and leading figures in Colombia, including
Horacio Serpa, the Liberal Party candidate for president.

In Mr. Castano's book, "My Confession: Carlos Castano Reveals His
Secrets," an as-told-to memoir written with a Colombian journalist,
Archbishop Duarte is called a friend. It was a label that clearly
troubled the archbishop.

"This is going to cause me many, many problems," he said.