A car bombing left at least seven policemen dead, six missing and one injured in southwestern Colombia Tuesday, said police sources.

The act aimed to attack a police patrol in the rural area of ElTablazo, the Valle del Cauca state.

According to the authorities, the car bombing was related to the members of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), the country's oldest and biggest rebel organization with 17,000 combatants.

The police embarked on a search and rescue operation to find the missing and get after the FARC.

Colombia has been plagued by a four-decade-long civil war, in which leftist rebels, far-right paramilitary and government troopsfight each other with an average of 3,500 people killed every year.

Source: Xinhua