BOGOTA, Colombia — Authorities yesterday ordered the arrest of President Uribe’s cousin and confidant Mario Uribe, charging him with criminal conspiracy for alleged dealings with outlawed paramilitary groups. The arrest warrant for Uribe, a former senator, brings a burgeoning “para-political” scandal involving the right-wing militias and Uribe-supporting Congress members closer to the president’s office. Until now, the controversy has done little damage to the Colombian president, who remains immensely popular.

Analysts described the arrest order of the president’s boyhood friend and closest political ally as a signal from chief federal prosecutor Mario Iguaran’s office that it would bring cases in the face of enormous political pressure.

“There was a lot of doubt that the prosecutor would take such a measure because of what Mario Uribe represents to the president,” a political scientist at Javeriana University in Bogota, Mauricio Romero, said.