Alleged Colombian Drug
Trafficker Reiterates
Ties With DEA
An alleged Colombian
drug trafficker said he
was an informant for the
U.S. Drug Enforcement
Agency (DEA) when he was
arrested, the local
Panamanian newspaper La
Prensa reported Tuesday.
"I was always in touch
with the DEA, the
problem is I do not
believe a country like
the United States can
intervene in another
country's judicial
process," Jose Nelson
Urrego, who is detained
in a Panamanian jail,
said in a telephone
interview with the
newspaper.
Urrego's defense lawyer
has presented a "public
interest" visa endorsed
by the U.S. government
to Panamanian
prosecutors.
According to the U.S.
Public Security
Department, the "public
interest entry permit"
is granted to certain
people that would not be
admitted into the United
States in normal
circumstances, but can
enter as they are part
of a legal process or
collaborate in a "very
important public
benefit."
The Panamanian Public
Ministry withheld one of
the satellite telephones
he was using to contact
the DEA, Urrego said.
Urrego, a former
communications head for
Colombia's Norte del
Valle drug cartel, was
arrested at Chapera
Island in the gulf of
Panama last September.
He was charged with
laundering some 13
million U.S. dollars in
four years in Panama.
Jose Abel Almengor,
Panama's first public
prosecutor against
drugs, confirmed that a
satellite telephone was
withheld in Chapera
Island, saying nothing
proves that it belongs
to the DEA.
Almengor said he asked
through Panama's embassy
in the United States
whether Urrego was a DEA
informant, but "the
answer denies the link."
In another interview
with Miami's Nuevo
Herald newspaper,
published Sunday, Urrego
said he started working
for the DEA after
serving a three-year
sentence at Picota
prison in Colombia's
capital, Bogota.
Meanwhile, Gavin
Sundwall, a spokesman
for the U.S. embassy in
Panama, said, "For
security and operative
reasons, we will not
comment if anybody acted
or not as an informant
or supplied aid to the
DEA."
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