GENEVA (Reuters) -- U.N. human rights chief Mary Robinson said on Friday
                   the situation in Colombia had deteriorated greatly in the past year, with killings,
                   including massacres, and kidnappings on the rise.

                   In a speech to the U.N. Commission on Human Rights, she said the majority of
                   alleged extrajudicial executions, torture and death threats were attributed to
                   paramilitary groups.

                   But her monitoring office in Bogata had also received reports charging soldiers
                   and police with responsibility for violations, she told the 53-member state forum
                   in Geneva.

                   Robinson's annual report on Colombia called on the government to "dismantle"
                   paramilitarism and prosecute its leaders "including public servants who have links
                   to it." The state must also protect prosecutors, judges, victims and witnesses as
                   well as potential targets -- including human rights advocates, trade unionists and
                   journalists, it added.

                   It cited "reports indicating that members of the military forces participate directly
                   in organizing new paramilitary groups and in disseminating threats."

                   "In some cases, victims recognized members of the military forces who formed
                   part of the paramilitary groups that committed the massacres."

                   Many of the 1,836 victims reportedly slain last year were university professors
                   and students, trade union leaders, human rights advocates, indigenous people
                   representatives, members of religious orders, journalists and peasants, it said.
                   The number was some 36 percent higher than a year before.

                   Colombia's ambassador Camilo Reyes Rodrigues said his government was
                   fighting the paramilitaries and would not tolerate complicity with them.

                   "As far as the self-defense groups are concerned, I must re-emphasize that since
                   it is state policy under the government of President Pastrana, we are determined
                   to fight them with all the means at our disposal and that we have taken an
                   unequivocal decision to dismiss and bring to justice any public servants who
                   might be linked in any way with these groups criminal actions."

                   Robinson's report comes after Marxist rebels and Colombian government
                   negotiators said on Thursday they were considering calling their first ceasefire in
                   13 years as they press ahead with talks to end the country's decades-old war.
                   More than 35,000 people have died in the past 10 years.

                   "Despite the efforts for peace, the human rights situation in Colombia has
                   deteriorated significantly," she told the main U.N. human rights forum holding its
                   annual six-week session.

                   "This deterioration has seen a rise in the number of allegations of extra-judicial
                   executions -- many of these having taken the form of massacres -- the
                   persistence of torture and enforced disappearances and an increase in the
                   number of death threats," she added.

                   "The majority of these allegations (of violations) have been attributed to
                   paramilitary groups."

                     Copyright 2000 Reuters.