Colombian rebel leader Ricardo Palmera was sentenced to 35 years for kidnapping and rebellion.

BOGOTA - (AP) -- The most senior Colombian rebel leader ever captured in Colombia was sentenced Tuesday to 35 years in prison for aggravated kidnapping and rebellion, a justice official said.

Ricardo Palmera was sentenced by a judge in the northern city of Valledupar after the trial in which the rebel appeared in the courtroom via a video hookup from a U.S.-built prison north of Bogotá. Authorities had deemed it too risky to transport Palmera to court, 430 miles away.

Palmera was a top member of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, when he was captured in Quito in January. His sentencing comes as Colombia's military forces, urged on by hard-line President Alvaro Uribe, is on an offensive against the FARC and a smaller rebel group.

Until Palmera's arrest, Colombian authorities had been unable to capture or kill any major leaders of the rebel groups that have been battling a succession of elected governments in Colombia for four decades.

Palmera, 53, pleaded guilty to rebellion but denied that he abducted former Valledupar Mayor Elias Ochoa, who testified at the trial that Palmera had kidnapped him.

Palmera, a former banker from Valledupar, left his wife and two children and headed into the jungle to join the rebels when he was in his mid-30s. He wound up serving as a top FARC negotiator in peace talks with the government that collapsed in February 2002.

Colombian authorities say Palmera was also in charge of the group's financing and that he sat on the FARC's General Staff. Palmera, however, said the government exaggerated his influence within the FARC.

Palmera is also charged withmurder in another case thathasn't gone to trial.

A former banker from Valledupar, Palmera left his wife and two children and headed into the jungle to join the rebels when he was in his mid-30s. He wound up serving as a top FARC negotiator in peace talks with the government that collapsed in February 2002.