Profile: Alvaro Uribe Velez

Alvaro Uribe Velez is a tough right-winger whose political life has been dominated by the desire to rid the country of the rebels who killed his father 20 years ago.

Mr Uribe is the US's staunchest ally in Latin America

He won office in 2002, following it in 2006 with a landslide victory that gave him the four more years he said he needed to tackle Colombia's armed groups and drug-traffickers.

The question now is whether momentum will build for Colombia's constitution to be changed to allow him to run for a third term in 2010.

Mr Uribe's hardline stance against the guerrillas who have waged a four decades-long war on the state has won him plaudits.

He has forced the rebels out of Colombia's towns and cities and back into the countryside, thereby bringing peace to the everyday lives of many Colombians.

His implacable stance against the rebels has kept his approval ratings above 70% for much of the time.

Mr Uribe can point to a series of successes against the guerrillas, in particular the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Farc). Senior rebel commanders have been killed and desertions from the rebel ranks have been increasing.

On 2 July, an audacious military operation tricked the rebels into handing over 15 of their highest profile hostages, including former presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt.

They were among some 40 hostages the Farc had sought to exchange for jailed rebels.

This development followed news in May that the Farc's leader, Manuel Marulanda, had died earlier in 2008.

Mr Uribe has repeatedly said he would offer peace talks to the Farc, who still control about a third of the country, but only if they first lay down their weapons.

Speaking after the hostages' rescue, the president called on the Farc to make serious peace moves and release the other several hundred hostages they hold.

Scandals

Mr Uribe can also point to success in tackling right-wing paramilitaries. In 2003, he negotiated a peace deal that saw paramilitary leaders surrender and demobilise 31,000 of their men in exchange for reduced jail terms and protection from extradition.

The fight against drug-trafficking has been long and costly

Human rights groups have argued that the government has been too lenient with the paramilitaries. Many received an amnesty despite committing abuses, including massacres, forced displacements and disappearances.

Mr Uribe is Washington's staunchest ally in Latin America.

Colombia is still the world's main producer of cocaine despite the government's attempts to eradicate drug crops, boosted by some $5bn (£2.5bn) in aid from the US through Plan Colombia.

But despite the close ties, a long awaited free trade agreement between Colombia and the US has still to clear the US Congress, where Democrats have been calling for Mr Uribe's government to do more to tackle violence against trade union leaders.

Back home, Mr Uribe is facing challenges in securing another change to the constitution to be able to run again for office.

In June, the Supreme Court called for an investigation into the legality of his 2006 re-election, after a former politician was convicted of taking a bribe to support the constitutional reform that granted Mr Uribe an unprecedented second term.

Mr Uribe has vehemently denied any wrongdoing.

Another issue that has erupted during Mr Uribe's term in office is known as the "parapolitics" scandal.

To date, inquiries have been opened into dozens of current or former members of congress over their alleged ties to the United Self-defence Forces of Colombia (AUC) paramilitaries.

Most of those being investigated are allies of President Uribe, including his cousin Mario Uribe, although the president himself has not been implicated.

'No bitterness'

Mr Uribe's relations with the Farc go back to 1983, when they killed his father in the family ranch in Antioquia.

"I hold no bitterness," he said before being elected president for the first time. "I just want to serve Colombia."

The rebels have tried to assassinate him several times. In April 2002, the guerrillas placed a bomb in a bus along the route Mr Uribe's campaign convoy was using in the Caribbean city of Barranquilla.

The bomb went off, but the armour of Mr Uribe's vehicle saved him from harm. Sixteen passers-by were not so lucky. Three were killed and 13 wounded in the blast.

The president travels with dozens of bodyguards and sniffer dogs.

Mr Uribe, born in July 1952, is a lawyer by training and was educated at Oxford and Harvard. He is married and has two sons.