The report covers the year 2005.

''Cases were recorded in which commanders themselves had allegedly supported the act of dressing the victims in guerrilla garments to cover up facts and simulate combat," the report said.

The government had no immediate response to the report. It has said that any member of its security forces found cooperating with the paramilitaries would be jailed.

Colombia is in a four-decade guerrilla war involving Marxist insurgents and far-right militias.

While President Alvaro Uribe, a US ally whose father was killed, allegedly by the insurgents, has negotiated a peace arrangement with the ''paras" and has reduced crime rates through his tough security policies, the UN report says grave rights violations continue.

''Both the lack of full acknowledgment of the problem by the government, as well as the absence of sufficient relevant actions by authorities, impeded correction," the report said.

More than 22,000 paramilitaries have surrendered guns, in an agreement promising reductions in jail terms of as many as eight years for crimes such as torture and massacre.

But politicians, academics, and human rights groups say the paramilitaries are not dismantling their criminal networks. They say the militias are using violence to influence the outcome of congressional elections in March, in an effort to gain political power and to avoid being extradited to the United States on drug charges.

© Copyright 2006 Globe Newspaper Company.

The Bolivian president was echoing demands of families of the victims of the so-called "Black February", as well as humanitarian activists to punish Sanchez de Losada and other masterminds and perpetrators of the killings.

Leaders of El Alto municipality, where most victims of the massacres of Feb and Oct, 2003 fell, said that if their demand is not met, indigenous community justice has to be applied in a certain way.

Aznar had committed himself to working to stop "the return to populism" in the area. He said, "Cuba, Venezuela, Bolivia, maybe Argentina. All those places run the risk."

Méndez said, "I'm surprised that a person with enough intellectual capacity to have his own voice" is agreeing with Bush on Latin American issues. He added, "In analyzing current politics in the region, you can "use the context of internal leadership in Latin America, or the Americanized viewpoint of the US, which Aznar supports."

Mendez added that Aznar was wrong when he called on Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez not to use "petrodollars" in foreign policy, because that would be like "asking Spain not to use the money it receives from tourism to make international policy, or Argentina not to use what it receives from meat to make international policy. This sort of right-wing statements have no validity nor stand up to minimal discourse."

According to Mendez, the US government is not against Latin American left-wing governments, but rather "against those who do not agree to the rights that the US claims." This "populism" which the US is fighting against, he said, "is putting an end to hunger in Venezuela, and building an extraordinary network in the public health field."

Meanwhile, Aznar, who is president of the Foundation for Social Study and Analysis (FAES), yesterday explained his project to improve relations between the US and the EU, at the invitation of former US president Bill Clinton. In his speech, he paid special attention to Euro-American relations and the mechanisms that should be created in order to improve trans-Atlantic relations. As an example, he mentioned his foundation's report on NATO reforms, which has been introduced in international circles, as well as the creation of an Atlantic area of prosperity that will "put an end to the current trade impediments."

He also urged supporters to protest peacefully, a day after at least one pro-Preval demonstrator was killed and followers elsewhere occupied a hotel.

Local Telemax TV news showed smashed ballot boxes in a garbage dump, with wads of ballots strewn about. Ballot after ballot was marked for Preval.

“We are convinced that either massive fraud or gross errors stain the (electoral) process” Preval said earlier in the day, adding that the official results “do not correspond with reality.”

White United Nations armoured vehicles shoved aside roadblocks of junked cars, old refrigerators and other debris blocking the streets of the capital Tuesday, and most were clear by mid-afternoon. Businesses remained shuttered, but street markets bustled with shoppers.

Preval, a former protege of ousted President Jean-Bertrand Aristide who enjoys wide support among the poor, called on followers to remove all roadblocks so people can get to work.

The most recent election results, posted Monday, showed Preval had 48.76 per cent of the vote with 90 per cent of ballots counted. He would need 50 per cent plus one vote from the Feb. 7 election to avoid a March run-off.

“If they publish the results as they are now, we will oppose them, the Haitian people will also oppose them, and there will be protests,” Preval told reporters.

The constitution indicates a challenge would go to the Supreme Court, but the interim government recently decreed that any complaints should go to the electoral commission — the same body issuing the results.

UN spokesman David Wimhurst said there was no evidence of fraud in the elections. The UN provided security for the vote and helped ship election returns to the capital but is not directly involved in counting ballots.

“If he believes there have been irregularities, he has the right to request an investigation,” Wimhurst told The Associated Press.

An official with the European Union, which has election observers here, declined comment on the vote count.

“The situation is volatile and difficult, and we do not want to make any declaration,” she said on condition of anonymity because she was not an official EU spokesperson. The Canadian observer group also refused to comment.

Election officials have not said when they will release final results. The UN said pro-Preval demonstrations were preventing election personnel from going to work and many counting centres had closed because of security concerns.

“I ask the Haitian people x .x .x . to be mature, to be responsible, to be nonviolent,” Preval said Tuesday.

The UN Security Council urged Haitians to respect election results and refrain from violence, and it extended the UN peacekeeping mission in Haiti for six months, until Aug. 15.

Some 7,300 UN troops and 1,750 international police are in the country under Brazilian command, helping national police maintain order. The UN mission replaced a U.S.-led force that arrived after a three-week uprising toppled Aristide in February 2004.

At least one protester was killed Monday in the Taberre neighbourhood. Witnesses said UN peacekeepers opened fire. Wimhurst first denied that peacekeepers fired any rounds, then later said they had fired in the air and that someone else fired shots afterward in the same area.

Preval, a former president, urged his supporters to “respect people’s belongings” and to be on guard against provocateurs.

He met the top UN official in Haiti and ambassadors from Canada, Brazil, France and the United States late Monday after coming to the capital on a UN helicopter from his rural home in the north.

A run-off would pit Preval against second-place finisher Leslie Manigat, also a former president, who received 11.8 per cent of the vote, according to preliminary results.

Manigat’s wife, Myrlande, declined to say whether anyone had approached her husband about withdrawing. “Our position is to wait until the (electoral council) releases the results,” she said.

Of the 2.2 million ballots cast, about 125,000 have been declared invalid because of irregularities, raising suspicion among Preval supporters that polling officials were rigging the election.

Four per cent of the ballots were blank but were still added to the total, making it harder for Preval to obtain the 50 per cent plus one vote needed.

Jacques Bernard, director general of the nine-member electoral council, has denied that the council voided many votes for Preval.