FARC guerrilla Gerardo Antonio Aguilar AKA "César" was extradited to the US July 16 to face drug charges. "César" guarded hostages including Ingrid Betancourt before his arrest in July 2008. He was turned over to the DEA and flow to Washington after being transfered from his Bogotá prison to El Catam military airfield. César "was commander of the First Front of the FARC and in that position in charge of the production and distribution of cocaine to the United States," Colombia's Supreme Court stated in February when it ruled to allow his extradition.

Peru's former president Alberto Fujimori admitted at the opening of his corruption trial July 20 that he had paid his spy chief Vladimiro Montesinos $15 million in public funds to quit as his regime collapsed in 2000. But he added: "I only accept the facts, I do not accept the criminal responsibility, the punishment or the civil reparations."

Two men armed with pistols shot Colombian indigenous leader Héctor Betancur Domicó dead the night of July 6 as he was leaving the offices of an indigenous organization in Tierralta in the northwestern department of Córdoba. Betancur Domicó was the leader of the Katío Embera community of Changarra, one of 17 small communities in the region, which has a total population of about 5,000 Katío Embera. The National Indigenous Organization of Colombia (ONIC) reported that more than 1,254 indigenous people have been killed by armed groups in Colombia since January 2002. (La Raza, Chicago, July 11 from AP)

A former Bolivian interior minister Luis Arce Gómez, 71, was deported July 9 to La Paz, where he is accused of human rights violations. "I hope last night's removal brings justice to the people of Bolivia who were victimized by the reprehensible acts that this man committed," Michael Rozos, director of the US Immigration and Customs and Enforcement (ICE) office of detention and removal in Florida, said in a statement.

Colombian bounty hunters shot and killed one of three hippopotami which escaped from a private zoo owned by the late Medellín Cartel kingpin Pablo Escobar. The hippos broke out of the zoo, on the drug lord's Hacienda Napoles in Antioquia department, in 2006 and thrived in the nearby Magdalena River. Officials say the animals are a threat to people and crops, and that all three have to be destroyed. Colombian TV broadcast images of the carcass of the fully grown male hippo, surrounded by hunters and soldiers. Animal rights groups reacted angrily to the killing. "They could have been captured and kept in a safe place until a permanent refuge was found for them," said Marcela Ramírez of the local Animal Protection Network.

Peru's government ordered more than 32,000 police and over 6,000 soldiers to keep order around the country as a paro or series of coordinated strikes against the free-trade policies of President Alan García entered its second day July 8. The education and transportation sectors are those most affected. The Unitary Syndicate of Peruvian Education Workers (SUTEP) claimed 80% teacher participation in the strike in Lima and 100% in the provinces, while the General Confederation of Peruvian Workers (CGTP) claimed widespread compliance with a transportation strike in the capital. Rallies were held in several locations around Lima, the largest being the Plaza Dos de Mayo. With bus lines halted, taxis and combis raised their prices.

Thousands of riders were stranded in Lima early on June 30 at the beginning of a 24-hour national strike by Peruvian urban transportation workers and owners. The strikers were protesting new regulations that were to take effect on July 1 and a new rate for fines that starts on July 21. In the southern Lima neighborhood of Villa El Salvador, a group of strikers hurled rocks at buses not honoring the strike call; police agents responded by shooting in the air, according to Radio Programas del Perú (RPP). In the north of the city some strikers stoned buses and burned tires; others used rocks to block the Carretera Central, which links Lima to the center of the country.

The former top leader of the disbanded United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC), Salvatore Mancuso, presented government prosecutors with the names of 31 high-ranking military and police officers who had ties to the outlawed paramilitaries—and even allowed them to carry out several massacres. Caracol Radio made public a document from the Fiscalía, or public prosecutor's office, that mentions the names of soldiers ranging from the rank of sergeant to general who Mancuso said participated in joint operations with the paramilitaries.