Poster boys. (Trade Talk).

In one fell swoop, members of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia moved from the category of "rebel" to that of "terrorist."

The Colombian government kicked off the persona non grate movement when it ordered the arrests of members of the group, which goes by the Spanish acronym FARC. International police agency Interpol followed up in May by putting 14 FARC leaders, including Commander Manuel "Tirofijo" Marulanda, on its terrorist wanted list alongside such notables as al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden.

The terrorist label is being used as leverage in U.S. President George Bush's push to expand multibillion dollar U.S. aid to Colombia-now limited to fighting narcotraffickers-to include terrorists. To bolster the bid, Colombian President Andres Pastrana has begun referring to FARC members as "narco-terrorists."

The United States recently issued extradition requests for Marulanda and FARC cohort Tomas Molina Caracas on cocaine-trafficking charges. And a U.S. grand jury in May indicted six other FARC members in the 1999 deaths of three U.S. citizens who were kidnapped in Colombia. The bodies of the human rights activists were recovered across the border in Venezuela.