The World : Key Aide Quits in Colombia

Colombia’s acting attorney general, Alfredo Gutierrez Marquez, resigned in the wake of disclosures about business dealings by members of his family with the notorious Medellin cocaine-smuggling cartel. Gutierrez, who assumed the attorney general’s post in January after Atty. Gen. Carlos Maura Hoyos was kidnaped and slain by alleged drug traffickers, had recently stirred controversy by declaring himself in favor of a dialogue with the so-called cocaine mafia. He argued that all other measures to fight drug trafficking had failed and expressed himself in favor of a possible legalization of the drug trade.