FARC rebels blamed for killings

There are fears that FARC may be changing their tactics

By Jeremy McDermott in Colombia

At least nine bodies have been found decapitated after more than 30 were kidnapped in northern Colombia.

Security forces found the headless corpses floating in a river in the northern province of Cordoba.

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The bodies are believed to be those of farmers kidnapped from the village of Tierralta over a week ago.

Local sources are saying the murders were carried out by the country's largest Marxist guerrilla army - the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC.

Sympathisers killed

The kidnapping, interrogation, torture and execution of civilians is usually the style of Colombia's right-wing death squads from the United Self-Defence Forces of Colombia, the AUC.

They have killed over 500 unarmed people so far this year.

Their tactic of terror and killing suspected guerrilla sympathisers has had success undermining rebel support in many areas of the country, particularly their stronghold of this northern province of Cordoba.

It has had so much success that there is fear that this latest massacre shows the guerrillas may be adopting their tactics.

Violent phase

Colombia's 37-year civil conflict is entering its most brutal and violent phase.

The country's 22,000 Marxist rebels are pitted against 8,000 right-wing paramilitaries, with the state more often than not just an observer.

Between the two illegal armies of the left and right they control over half of Colombia and, led by the paramilitaries, have increasingly targeted the other side's civilian support base.

If this latest massacre is found to be the work of the FARC, and they are adopting AUC murder tactics, analysts here expect yet more civilians to turn up dead, and all too often mutilated.