Luis Arce Gómez

Who is Luis Arce Gómez?

Luis Arce Gómez was a colonel in the Bolivian Army. In 1980 he backed the bloody coup that brought to power the infamous General Luis García Meza. Arce served as García Meza's Minister of the Interior.

Arce's tenure as Minister involved the passing of such measures as the banning of all political parties, the incarceration and/or exile of most political opponents, the repression of trade unions, and the censorship of the mass media. Arce is reported to have said that all Bolivians who may be opposed to the new order should "walk around with their written will under their arms."

The García Meza government was also deeply involved in drug trafficking activities, with Arce as a link. Eventually, Arce was forced to resign, as was García. In the late 1980s, Arce was extradited to the United States, where he was put in jail, serving a lengthy sentence for drug trafficking. On April 21, 1993, while he was still incarcerated, he was condemned by the Bolivian justice system to 30 years in prison for serious human rights violations incurred by the regime he took part in.

In November 2007 he was released from his US prison sentence, and applied for political asylum in the US.