The government of Colombia is apparently riddled with people tied to the para-military forces and death squads. Or so it appears from the resignation of a top Colombian official:

The foreign minister of Colombia resigned Monday as the government of President Álvaro Uribe, the Bush administration’s closest ally in South America, struggled with a scandal that has disclosed ties between paramilitary cocaine-trafficking squads and some of Mr. Uribe’s most prominent political supporters.

This episode, and others surfacing almost daily in Colombia, may slow down the rush to cram another so-called “free trade” agreement down the throats of another country in the Americas. We can only hope.