Brother's arrest hits home for Colombia's top cop

BOGOTA, July 18 (Reuters) Gen Oscar Naranjo's career was forged in the hunt for Colombia's most notorious drug lord, Pablo Escobar, who was shot dead in December 1993 as he fled across the rooftops of Medellin.

Now Colombia's top police chief, the well-spoken Naranjo has a reputation for cool efficiency and is a key figure in the US-backed war against Colombia's drug cartels.

The destructive influence of the multi-billion dollar cocaine trade hit close to home last year when his younger brother was arrested in Germany for trafficking.

''I am not the same ... it changed my life,'' Naranjo told Reuters in a recent interview at his Bogota office. ''In professional terms, it humanized me.'' Police and judges are common targets and the choice of huge bribes for working with the cartels or death if you oppose them is often known as ''plata o plomo'' -- silver or lead.

Naranjo survived the scandal surrounding his brother and US officials decribe him as a top-flight officer.

He says he is more committed than ever to tackling the cartels.

''I am sure now my spirit to fight against drug trafficking has been reinforced because I lived the tragedy in a personal and direct way.'' SENDING A MESSAGE Colombia is the world's top producer of cocaine despite billions of dollars in US aid to battle traffickers and left-wing guerrillas also engaged in the drugs trade.

It produces more than 600 tonnes of the illicit white powder each year and most of that ends up on the streets of the United States and Europe via Central America, Mexico and increasingly west Africa.

More than a decade after Escobar's death, cocaine still fuels violence in Colombia although the darker days of the Medellin and Cali cartels are over and Mexican gangs take over the business of delivering the drug onto US streets.

Hundreds of drug suspects have been extradited to the United States since Uribe came to office in 2002.

''Sometimes I admit you feel impotent. That is overcome with lessons in intelligence, sacrifice and heroism,'' Naranjo said.

''Every time you arrest a druglord, you know it is not the end, but with that arrest you are sending out a message.'' He says Colombia is a safer place than before with stronger institutions to fight traffickers even if years of massive military spending have failed to stem the flow of cocaine.

''What is the role of a security force? It is to fight to reduce crime to the minimum, Naranjo said. ''Doctors face the same thing. Doctors don't give up and say they are defeated just because diseases keep killing.'' REUTERS SW RK0924