AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE

Tuesday, 4 August 1998


                35 killed in rebel attacks as Colombia
                     rebel offensive continues
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BOGOTA -- At least 35 people were killed and 44   wounded Tuesday in a
series of pre-dawn attacks by leftist rebels, staged just before Colombia's new 
president takes office.

The dead included soldiers, police and civilians, and does not include
13 kidnapped civilians and 22 missing soldiers believed to be guerrilla
prisoners, Defense Minister Gilberto Echeverri said.

The new total brings to 54 the number who have died since Colombia's
largest guerrilla force began their offensive on Monday. Some 44 have
been wounded and 13 kidnapped, officials said.

Rebels of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) have targeted
army and police posts throughout 17 of the country's 32 provinces.

The fiercest fighting was in the cities of Medellin, Cucuta, and in the
Pacific coast city of Buenaventura, where rebels used three car bombs to
attack an army barracks and two police stations, the minister said.

Guaviare province in the southeast was the scene of heavy fighting when
FARC guerrillas attacked a police anti-drug base, Echeverri said.

Twenty-two police officers, 17 soldiers, eight civilians and eight
guerrillas were killed in fighting there, he said.

Conservative President-elect Andres Pastrana --who takes office on Friday--
vowed to continue his efforts to bring peace to the South American
nation.

"Peace is not achieved overnight," Pastrana told a press conference after
returning from a 24-hour visit to Washington. "It can even be reached in
the middle of a war."

The clashes with leftist guerrillas comes after civilian killings Sunday
in the northeast city of Barrancabermeja, Colombia's largest oil refinery
and an area of support for the rebels.

Right-wing paramilitaries were blamed when eight civilians were gunned
down there, following the publication of a government report that linked
the military to a massacre of 36 people in Barrancabermeja earlier this
year.

The rebels refused to negotiate with outgoing President Ernesto Samper,
who many accused of corruption, but have said they will talk with the new
president.

Pastrana --who held talks in Washington Monday with US President Bill
Clinton-- made peace with Colombia's two major guerrilla groups and
paramilitary organizations a key plank in his election platform.

The three-decade-old civil conflict has heated up in the past two years,
leaving some 6,000 people dead in 1997. About one million people have been
displaced by the violence pitting the rebels against the military and
right-wing death squads.

        Copyright 1998 Agence France-Presse