US seeks Colombian paramilitary

The move comes a few days after Jimenez, alias Macaco, was stripped of his preferential prison treatment afforded to demobilised fighters.

Colombia said Jimenez violated a peace agreement by continuing to organise cocaine shipments and run a criminal empire from prison.

Jimenez is wanted in the US on drug trafficking charges.

'Atrocities'

On Friday, Jimenez was transferred to Colombia's most secure prison, Combita, to be tried as an ordinary criminal.

He is the first jailed warlord to lose benefits agreed under a 2003 peace deal which led paramilitary leaders to surrender and demobilise 31,000 of their men in exchange for reduced jail terms and extradition protection.

The paramilitaries were created to combat rebel armies but evolved into drug-trafficking cartels accused of committing some of the country's worst atrocities.

Jimenez commanded what is thought to be Colombia's largest paramilitary group, the United Self-Defence Forces of Colombia (AUC).

In February 2006, 2,500 fighters of the Central Bolivar Bloc - which is part of the AUC - surrendered their weapons under the ongoing efforts to broker peace in the country.