2 arrested in Colombia after swallowing dollars

BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) - Colombian police on Friday said they had arrested two men at an airport in Medellin after discovering they were smuggling US$80,000 (S$98,270)in cash hidden in their stomachs.

Authorities say the men swallowed the dollars wrapped in latex, much like some drug smugglers hide cocaine and heroin.

A Colombian citizen was taken into custody on Sept 8 after arriving on a flight from Costa Rica. Authorities say he had seemed nervous and later admitted swallowing the money, which was all in US$100 bills and separated into 40 latex-covered packets, each of them about an inch in diameter.

Police took the man to a clinic in Medellin and gave him laxatives that forced him to pass the packets in his stool.