Paramilitary Groups Disarm in Colombia
Hundreds of paramilitary fighters handed in their weapons and renounced violence Wednesday in a ceremony in southern Colombia, the country's peace commissioner said.

Separately, the U.S. Embassy in Colombia said it would not penalize companies for hiring former members of armed groups that Washington considers terrorist organizations -- a declaration that may help the fighters abandon warfare and crime.

The 552 combatants who disarmed were members of the Central Bolivar Bloc of the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia, or AUC, considered by the United States as a terrorist organization with links to major drug traffickers.

The ceremony, attended by the peace commissioner, Luis Carlos Restrepo, took place on a farm near the town of Valparaiso, 260 miles south of Bogota. With the ceremony, more than 22,500 paramilitary fighters have benefited under a government-brokered peace deal with AUC.

Under the deal, each combatant will be granted amnesty from prosecution for rebellion and assistance in their reintegration into civil society.

The final few thousand AUC members still active are expected to disarm in the coming weeks.

The U.S. Embassy said Tuesday that illegal fighters who disarmed under a recent Colombian peace deal "were required to renounce their membership in any and all terrorist organizations and have sworn not to rejoin or support such organizations."

More than 3,000 Colombians are killed every year in a triangular conflict among government troops, leftist rebels and right-wing paramilitary fighters.