Bolivia's jailed former 'minister for cocaine' dies at 82

FILE PHOTO: Former Bolivian Interior Minister Luis Arce Gomez is transported in a wheelchair by policemen after listening to his sentence of 30 years in prison in Chonchocoro jail July 13, 2009. Arce Gomez was handed over to Bolivia by the U.S. on Thursday. Arce Gomez is wanted in Bolivia for crimes that include murder, human rights violations and genocide. REUTERS/David Mercado

LA PAZ (Reuters) - A former Bolivian interior minister known as "Minister for Cocaine" for his role in turning the impoverished nation into a narco-state during a military dictatorship in the 1980s has died after decades in prison, local media said on Tuesday, citing a Bolivian government minister.

Luis Arce Gomez, reported by local media to be 82, was interior minister in the Andean nation's 1980-81 dictatorship of General Luis Garcia Meza. He was accused of presiding over the deaths and disappearances of more than 100 political prisoners, as well as the detentions of 4,000 more who alleged human rights abuses.