Photo Shows President With Drug Suspects

A photograph showing President Ernesto Samper with two suspected members of the Cali drug cartel has surfaced days before Congress is to decide whether to impeach him.

Samper’s former campaign director and treasurer, both under arrest, have testified that the president accepted $6 million from the cartel to finance his 1994 campaign.

Although Samper is expected to survive the vote in Congress - where allies outnumber opponents - the photograph heightened suspicion.

The picture, broadcast on Colombian TV news programs Monday night, shows Samper standing between former Cali official Fernando Espinosa and Elizabeth Montoya de Sarria, an alleged associate of the cartel.

In the picture, Samper has his arm around Montoya de Sarria, who was killed in March. Espinosa was assassinated in 1989.

The news program TV HOY also broadcast a telephone interview with a woman who said she saw Samper receive $800,000 from Cali cartel kingpin Miguel Rodriguez Orejuela in 1989. The news program said the woman was a source for the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency.