Newsmakers

Former Colombian president denies role in assassination

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2011-06-18 17:10

BOGOTA -- Former Colombian President Ernesto Samper on Friday denied involvement in the 1995 assassination of political leader Alvaro Gomez Hurtado.

Hernando Gomez Bustamante, a drug trafficker extradited to the United States, recently confessed that Samper and then cabinet minister Horacio Serpa Uribe plotted to kill Gomez Hurtado, a former senator and three-time candidate for the presidency.

"Nobody but me is interested in clarifying the assassination of Alvaro Gomez. It is a shame that my name be immersed. Alvaro and I were friends," Samper wrote on his Twitter account.

Gomez Hurtado was shot dead in his car after teaching a class at Sergio Arboleda University on November 2, 1995. He had reportedly written editorials urging Samper to resign over allegations he had used drug cartel donations to win the 1994 elections.

Serpa, a former minister and current governor of Santander, also denied the accusations.

The Gomez Hurtado family said Congressman Miguel Gomez, the slain leader's nephew, had to leave the country with his family due to recent death threats and a bomb detonated in a park Thursday night that was intended to intimidate the family.

The bomb went off in a park in northern Bogota, damaging 50 houses, stores and the monument of late Colombian President Laureano Gomez.

"We know who's the murderer of my brother, and we will reveal it in a book. We will remain cautious until the publication of the book," said Enrique Gomez Hurtado, brother of the political leader.