Colombia says kills top guerrilla commander

BOGOTA, Sept 3 (Reuters) Colombian soldiers killed a guerrilla leader wanted by the United States for drug trafficking in a major blow to Latin America's oldest insurgency, authorities said today.

Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos said Tomas Medina, known as ''El Negro Acacio'' (The Black Acacia) and a senior figure involved in drugs and arms smuggling for the FARC rebels, was killed with 16 other guerrillas in a weekend bombing of his jungle camp.

''This is without a doubt the severest blow to the FARC's logistics,'' Santos said. ''He was a key to FARC financing and support and controlled drug trafficking and purchase of arms, explosives and munitions in the east of the country.'' Under President Alvaro Uribe, Colombia's armed forces have pushed the FARC back into the jungles and violence from the 40-year conflict has eased. But the rebels are still a potent force -- 11 soldiers were killed in an ambush at the weekend.

Aided by billions in US military aid, Uribe has promised to defeat the FARC, which began as a peasant army in the 1960s fighting for a socialist state, but which is now engaged in the country's huge cocaine trafficking trade.

Medina has been accused of working with a top Brazilian drug trafficker who was captured in southern Colombia in 2001 and deported to Brazil. He operated in the remote jungle areas near Venezuela's border with Brazil.

Santos said troops who searched the camp after it was bombarded by military aircraft could not find the rebel's body. But he said intelligence sources, including some from the FARC, proved Medina was killed in the assault.

The blow to the FARC -- Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia -- comes as Uribe tries to negotiate the release of scores of hostages held for years by the rebels, including French-Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt and three American contract workers.

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez last week said during a visit to Bogota that he planned to hold talks with a top FARC representative in Venezuela in an effort to break a deadlock over exchanging hostages for jailed guerrillas.

REUTERS BJR KN0233