Seven people were killed and some 70 wounded when suspected leftist rebels detonated explosives near a police station in the south-western town of Tumaco on Wednesday, Red Cross officials said. Four police officers and three civilians were killed in the blast, Red Cross Urgent Assistance director Cesar Uruena told RCN radio. Of those wounded, 34 were police officers and 36 civilians, Uruena added.
The flood of wounded swamped local hospital's capacity, and some of the most seriously wounded were evacuated. The bomb, apparently hidden inside a motorbike, blew up outside the police station on a busy street with many pedestrians close by, said Victor Gallo, mayor of the town of 170,000 located in the Narino department on the Pacific. Rodolfo Palomino, the citizen security director of Colombia's National Police, blamed the attack on the Marxist Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC).