BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) -- It was a most unpresidential spectacle: President Alvaro Uribe upbraiding the editor of Colombia's top news magazine on morning talk radio for rekindling a corruption scandal just weeks before he stands for re-election.

The magazine Semana had doggedly reported on allegations of fraud in Uribe's 2002 election victory, a conspiracy to assassinate leftist and union activists, and the leaking of sensitive information to drug traffickers and right-wing paramilitary groups.

Semana also reported that officials in the state security agency, known as DAS, allegedly plotted to destabilize the government of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez.

All this comes ahead of May 28 presidential elections in which Uribe, Washington's top ally in South America, enjoys a comfortable lead in opinion polls, having made this notoriously violent country considerably safer for the average citizen.

Uribe's stern lecture to Semana's editor, Alejandro Santos, was considered by groups including Human Rights Watch to be a frightening attempt to muzzle the press in a country where journalism is already a very dangerous profession.

"This topic is so delicate that the reports gave grounds for rendering the government illegitimate," Uribe complained to Santos of the DAS scandal coverage. "The harm isn't to Alvaro Uribe. The harm is to the legitimacy of Colombian democracy, to a country that for the first time is beginning to see a bonanza of investment."

Uribe proceeded to exhaustively detail his 2002 vote counts from the Caribbean region where the alleged fraud occurred, resisting interruption by the radio show host.

Colombia's law-and-order president is known for losing his temper with reporters, and his impulsive nature was on display in a barrage of recent radio and TV appearances he initiated to defend his administration.