Children dead as gang kills Colombian family

Children were among 12 Colombian tribespeople killed when a gang of armed men attacked a family in an area known for its cocaine trade, authorities say.

Five men, two women, two boys, two girls and a baby died in the dawn attack by hooded men in uniforms at an Indian reservation in south-west Colombia. A man and a boy were also wounded in the shooting but escaped, the BBC reported, quoting state officials.

The armed men shot the members of a family belonging to the local Awa tribe, who were in two houses in the Gran Rosario reserve. About 1,500 members of the Awa live on the Gran Rosario reservation, about 50 miles inland from the port of Tumaco in Narino state. The gunmen asked for a woman called The Matron about a purported debt, and then started shooting "at anything that moved”, said a government official.

State governor Antonio Navarro told reporters the victims were all related. Mr Navarro said a 10-year-old boy and a man, aged 20, were wounded in the gunfire but fled and survived.

The area is bursting with coca plantations and illegal armed groups that process the leaf into cocaine and smuggle it out of the country down the rivers that are the region's main highways. Earlier this year 17 Awa people were killed in an attack blamed on The Revoluntionary Armed Forces of Columbia (Farc) rebels, with 10 others murdered a week later.

The killers in this latest attack were said to be wearing uniforms without badges. Their identities are unknown and the state and central governments have put up rewards for information leading to their arrests.

"We know they were hitmen, but we don't know who hired them, whether paramilitaries, the Farc, or some other group linked to the security forces," Luis Evelis Andrade, the head of Colombia's National Indigenous Organisation told the BBC.

But, Mr Navarro said that unlike in previous attacks, there were no signs yet that the guerrillas are behind the latest killing."It pains us to the core," said Colombian President Alvaro Uribe after holding a meeting to discuss the killings. The UN Human Rights Commissioner is expected to carry out an investigation into the massacre.