Bogota, Colombia ? Drug kingpin Gilberto Rodriguez Orejuela, wearing handcuffs and a bulletproof vest, flew late Friday aboard a government plane for trial in the United States, becoming the most powerful Colombian trafficker to ever be extradited to the United States.

A phalanx of helmeted police armed with assault rifles escorted the leader of the once-feared Cali drug cartel to the plane at a military airfield on the edge of Bogota. It took off into the night sky minutes later. Top American and Colombian authorities hailed the extradition.

“Every day judicial cooperation between our two countries is becoming more effective and more visible,” said Col. Oscar Naranjo, chief of Colombia’s Judicial Police. “This means that the criminals will not find any sanctuary to evade justice.”

U.S. Atty. Gen. John Ashcroft said: “Those who violate federal drug laws should never believe that drug trafficking from outside our borders puts them beyond the reach of justice. … Rodriguez Orejuela will now stand trial for his actions.”

Soldiers and police guarded a convoy that sped the kingpin from prison to the airfield.

Rodriguez Orejuela, whose hair has gone gray and who has turned chubby while in a Colombian prison over the past nine years, faces trial in federal courts in Miami and New York for trafficking cocaine and laundering money.