BOGOTA, (Reuters) – Police yesterday captured  Colombia’s most wanted drug lord, a former paramilitary fighter  who had offered his gunmen a $1,000 reward for each policeman  they killed.

Daniel Rendon Herrera, alias “Don Mario”, was surrounded  and arrested in the jungles of northern Antioquia province,  from where his gang smuggled tonnes of cocaine from the  Caribbean coast toward the United States, officials said.

The portly and bearded captive had his hands bound in front  of him as he was led onto a Bogota-bound plane. In a blue and  brown T-shirt and loose fitting gray pants, Rendon Herrera  looked somber and disheveled as he boarded the flight. Colombia had offered a $2 million reward for information  leading to the capture of Rendon Herrera, who is wanted by the  United States on drug trafficking charges.

As authorities closed in earlier this year, Rendon Herrera  offered his gunmen $1,000 for every officer they killed. He  also battled against rival gangs, made up mostly of former  paramilitary members, that tried to horn in on his turf.

His ruthless style recalled that of Colombia’s best-known  drug baron Pablo Escobar, who waged war against the state in  the 1980s until he was gunned down by security forces on a  Medellin rooftop in 1993.

Rendon Herrera has been charged by U.S. authorities, a  spokesman for the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration said in  Washington. The spokesman did not say whether the United States  would seek his extradition.

Rendon Herrera belonged to one of the paramilitary groups  that began demobilizing after a 2003 peace deal with the  government, but he refused to confess his crimes as required  under the accord and went into hiding.

He is the brother of a jailed paramilitary warlord known as  “El Aleman”, or “The German”, a nickname he earned for his  reputation of enforcing strict discipline among his troops.

Rendon Herrera is accused of running cocaine trafficking in  the area controlled by his brother in the 1990s, when  right-wing paramilitaries battled leftist guerrillas for  control of rural Colombia.

The South American country, the world’s largest cocaine  producer, has become less violent under President Alvaro Uribe,  who has used billions of dollars in U.S. military aid to battle  the guerrillas and disarm the paramilitaries.

Much of the cocaine is smuggled to the United States  through Mexico, where thousands of people have been killed by  Mexican cartels that have taken over from Colombian gangs as  the dominant drug traffickers in the Americas.

Colombia continues to export about 600 tonnes of cocaine  every year and law enforcement efforts have done little to  reduce production, according to the United Nations.

“Don Mario was the most important drug trafficker out  there, but someone will take his place very quickly and it will  be business as usual,” said Bogota-based security consultant  Pablo Casas.

“His organization is as well structured as any company,  where the CEO can be replaced at any time,” Casas said.

The Uribe government hailed his capture as a major victory  for law and order. “This is good news for the security of all  Colombians and bolsters democracy,” Uribe’s press spokesman  Cesar Velasquez said in a statement.