Colombia extradited a FARC rebel commander to the United States who may open a window on the guerrillas' drug and weapons trafficking.

By STEVEN DUDLEY

BOGOTA - Colombia on Wednesday extradited to the United States a guerrilla chieftain believed to have detailed knowledge about the rebels' cocaine and weapons smuggling -- and who may cooperate with U.S. prosecutors.

Omaira Rojas Cabrera, a member of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, better known as FARC, will go before a U.S. federal court in Washington to face charges of sending 11 pounds of cocaine to the United States.

Known as Comandante Sonia, Rojas is the sixth member of FARC to be extradited to the United States and the fourth in the past two years. Washington has asked for six more, most of them FARC leaders still at large.

But Rojas may be the most important FARC member extradited to date because she has firsthand knowledge of the rebels' weapons and drug trafficking networks in the southern part of Colombia, and is more likely to cooperate with U.S. prosecutors than some of her FARC colleagues, government officials in Colombia said.

During her nearly two decades with the FARC, she rose to the level of treasurer in the Southern Bloc, the regional command that pioneered the practice of collecting ''taxes'' on local drug producers and traffickers. Eventually, some FARC units started directly trafficking in cocaine and the less refined coca base as well, authorities allege.

A recent Colombian government report estimated that the FARC made as much as $600 million in 2003 from what the report called the ''commercialization'' of processed cocaine.

Of its seven blocs, the Southern Bloc remains one of the FARC's principal money-making units and its second-in-command, José Benito Cabrera, aka Fabian Ramírez, is also wanted in the United States for drug trafficking. Cabrera remains at large.

Rojas is charged with sending five kilos of cocaine to the United States in conjunction with Cabrera and two other members of the Southern Bloc. If she cooperates with U.S. prosecutors, she could implicate other members of the FARC's high command, U.S. and Colombian authorities say.

FEARFUL OF HER SAFETY

Colombian officials were so fearful of a FARC assassination attempt on Rojas before she was extradited that they put her on a naval ship over the Christmas holidays, transferred her later to a maximum security prison and constantly monitored her food for poison.

Rojas' extradition raised concerns, however, that by sending so many FARC leaders to face U.S. justice, Colombian President Alvaro Uribe is losing bargaining chips in possible peace talks or prisoner swaps with the FARC.

The FARC is currently holding three U.S. defense contractors, a German citizen and dozens of Colombian politicians that the guerrillas hope to swap with prisoners in Colombian and now U.S. jails.

AFFECTS NEGOTIATIONS

''If the government has captured several commanders, then they have the ability to negotiate,'' said former Justice Minister Carlos Medellín. ``If the government captures and sends them out quickly, they lose the ability to negotiate.''

The FARC recently put rebel chieftain Ricardo Palmera, aka Simón Trinidad -- extradited to the United States in early January to face charges of terrorism, kidnapping and drug trafficking -- on its list of ``swappables.''

But the FARC and Uribe have so far not been able to agree on either a swap of prisoners or negotiations to end the four-decades old conflict. And the United States would never agree to a swap of prisoners in its custody.

Uribe has extradited nearly 200 suspected drug traffickers to the United States since he took office in August 2002, and analysts agree that the prospect of extraditions helped push the FARC's nemesis, the right-wing United Self Defense Forces of Colombia, or AUC, into peace talks because AUC leaders are also charged with drug trafficking in the United States.

Analysts say the FARC see themselves as different because they believe their criminal activities are justified as part of their ideology on behalf of Colombia's poor. Government officials have called the FARC ''narco-guerrillas'' for two decades.