Right-wing warlord and drug trafficker Ramiro ''Cuco'' Vanoy took the stand in Colombia's special peace court this past spring and calmly told a mother that her son's body was tossed in the river after he stole a rifle.

Another mother testified that she found her son's leg and wanted to know if Vanoy knew where to find the rest of his remains. The former commander of the United Self Defense Forces of Colombia's (AUC) Miners Bloc, who had admitted to about 200 murders, said he would look into it.

Vanoy and Francisco Javier Zuluaga-Lindo -- the former commander of the AUC's Pacific bloc who's better known as ''Gordo Lindo'' -- will be sentenced on drug charges Thursday before U.S. District Judge K. Michael Moore. They pleaded guilty to a 1999 ''Operation Millennium'' indictment in a plea bargain that human rights groups say leaves victims of paramilitary violence still yearning for the one thing they most wanted: truth.

''It's worrisome for us victims, because it gives more importance to drug cases and sets aside crimes against humanity,'' said Jorge Salazar, a peasant who fled his town in the Alto Naya region in southwest Colombia when paramilitaries came through with chain saws. ``When they extradited them, they trampled over justice and made a mockery of our rights. We still want to know: who gave the order?''

EXTRADITIONS

Vanoy's spring testimony, confirmed by his defense attorney in Bogotá, was part of a peace agreement between the 35,000 members of Vanoy's right wing paramilitary group and the government that required illegal combatants who laid down their arms to tell the truth about murders and massacres. Vanoy's declaration was cut short: he, Zuluaga and 13 others were extradited in May to face drug charges in the United States, where they face decades in prison for moving tons of cocaine from Colombian jungles onto American streets.

Human rights activists say the extraditions severely undermined Colombia's Justice and Peace process and threw any future testimony into doubt. The Colombian Commission of Jurists, a leading human rights group, sent letters this week to Judge Moore and U.S. Attorney Michael B. Mukasey asking them to reject the plea bargains.

While activists balked at the pleas, Colombian and U.S. federal prosecutors met in Miami on Wednesday to work out logistics for the men to testify before Colombia's truth commission via live teleconference.

Salazar, 42, fled the Alto Naya area during Holy Week 2001, when hundreds of paramilitaries came to his town on a rampage, because they believed peasants had collaborated with left-wing guerrillas. Officially, 32 people died, although Salazar said everyone in town knows where more dismembered bodies are buried.

''They killed everyone they came across,'' Salazar said in a telephone interview from Cauca. ``I lost a lot of friends. We are still struggling for all the widows that massacre left.''

`THE LAWFUL LIFE'

Although never charged, Zuluaga was implicated in the case because one of the blocs involved was under his command. ''I should never have left the lawful life,'' Zuluaga testified shortly before he was extradited, according to Medellín's El Colombiano newspaper. ``I ask for forgiveness for what I did, what I could have prevented, and what I could have done better. . . . I answer to all the crimes I committed, which are very grave.''

Zuluaga was among the more controversial participants in Colombia's peace process, because he is believed to have been a drug trafficker who paid millions of dollars for a paramilitary ''franchise'' so he could be included in the peace process and avoid extradition.

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