CHILE will press France to extradite former guerilla Ricardo Palma Salamanca, who was arrested on Thursday after 22 years on the run.

Mr Palma Salamanca killed senator Jaime Guzman, a top adviser to fascist former president Augusto Pinochet, in 1991 in an ambush on his car. He also kidnapped Cristian Edwards, the son of the owner of El Mercurio newspaper.

He was a member of the Manuel Rodriguez Patriotic Front (FPMR), the military wing of the Chilean Communist Party named after the hero of the country’s war of independence against Spain.

Mr Palma Salamanca was sprung from jail in a daring prison break in 1996. A helicopter lowered an armoured cage into a high-security Santiago prison into which he jumped with three other FPMR members to freedom.

The escape was thought to have been orchestrated by his accomplice in the Guzman killing, Raul Escobar Poblete, aka Comandante Emilio.

He is thought to have fled to Mexico, leaving last year when Mr Escobar Poblete was arrested, to go to Cuba and France, where he was arrested on Thursday on a street in Paris.

Chilean Supreme Court judge Mario Carroza said he had been detained in France last December but was released.

Chile’s Independent Democratic Union, the party founded by Mr Guzman, welcomed the arrest, saying current leader Juan Antonio Coloma would visit France soon to speed up the extradition process so he can return and complete his life sentence.

A court banned Mr Palma Salamanca on Saturday from leaving France, ordering him to attend a police station every day. The extradition hearing is expected to take place next month.

Chilean Foreign Minister Heraldo Munoz said the Chilean government had contracted a “very prestigious” lawyer for the case.