By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

              BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) -- The nation's second-largest guerrilla group has
              suspended discussions with the government in apparent protest of U.S.-backed
              drug fumigations in northern Colombia.

              The National Liberation Army, or ELN, announced the suspension in an e-mail sent
              to government peace envoy Camilo Gomez, the presidential palace said Saturday.

              Before the rupture, the government appeared on the brink of ceding a
              Delaware-sized swath of territory to the ELN in the region where the fumigations
              are taking place to launch peace negotiations. The 5,000-strong insurgency has been
              fighting the state for more than three decades.

              Government officials, however, were optimistic that discussions aimed at beginning
              formal peace negotiations would resume quickly.

              ``This is an impasse that we hope to overcome,'' said Gomez.

              Although the content of ELN commander Paul Beltran's message wasn't revealed,
              local news reports said the ELN broke off talks to protest U.S.-backed aerial
              fumigations in the southern part of Bolivar State that the rebels view as unwelcome
              foreign intervention.

              Washington is supporting the drug war through a $1.3 billion aid package that
              includes military hardware and training for Colombian counternarcotics troops. The
              drug crops are guarded by leftist rebels and right-wing paramilitaries who earn
              millions of dollars a year from the nation's narcotics industry.

              The Bolivar fumigations began last month when low-flying airplanes backed by
              helicopter gunships began spraying herbicide on crops of coca -- the raw ingredient
              of cocaine.

              Sprayings launched last December in southern Colombia have destroyed some
              72,000 acres of coca, according to U.S. and Colombian officials. Critics say the
              sprayings are also killing food crops and leaving farmers sick and with no other
              source of income.

              The controversial land deal the government and the ELN were closing in on would
              have relinquished territory to the guerrillas for nine months to host peace talks.

              Experts say the ELN has been debilitated by a string of military defeats and is ready
              to end its insurrection. Last December, it freed 42 captive police and soldiers to
              advance discussions with the government.

              Colombia's government has been holding turbulent peace negotiations with the
              nation's largest guerrilla group, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, for
              two years.