BOGOTA, Colombia (Reuters) -- Marxist rebels killed five policemen
                   Wednesday and bombed a small commercial airstrip in a trouble-torn region
                   of northwest Colombia criss-crossed by lucrative arms and drugs-smuggling
                   routes.

                   A police spokesman said Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia
                   (FARC) rebels ambushed the police patrol near the town of Urrao, in
                   Antioquia province, as it went to meet passengers off the daily flight.

                   The guerrilla unit then used explosives on the runway and control tower,
                   forcing the plane to turn back. The region is hotly disputed by the FARC
                   and their ultra-right paramilitary rivals.

                   Urrao is seen as one of the gateways to the banana-growing region of Uraba
                   which stretches up to the border with Panama, a transit point for arms and
                   drugs smuggling.

                   In a separate incident in northeast Norte de Santander province, two
                   soldiers and five National Liberation Army (ELN) guerrillas died in the latest
                   of what are almost daily clashes close to the Venezuelan border.

                   The government launched peace talks with the FARC a year ago without a
                   prior cease-fire deal and has repeatedly called for talks with the ELN to end
                   the country's long-running civil conflict that has claimed more than 35,000
                   lives in just 10 years.

                    Copyright 2000 Reuters.