Venezuela Rebuts Charges

Venezuela formally protested to Colombia on Wednesday what it called a “malicious” Colombian army report that left-wing guerrillas were operating from a base in Venezuelan territory.

The diplomatic protest note, which was delivered to the Colombian Embassy in Caracas, rejected allegations made last week by a Colombian army general who said Marxist rebels had crossed from Venezuela to attack Colombian troops.

Venezuelan Foreign Minister Luis Alfonso Davila, who read the note at a news conference in Caracas, the capital, said the Colombian authorities were not doing enough to halt the spillover of violence and drug-trafficking activities across the 1,380-mile border between the neighboring Andean nations.

In a statement last week, Colombian army Gen. Martin Orlando Carreno said rebels of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, known by its Spanish initials FARC, used a base inside Venezuela to lob gas cylinders at his troops and as a launching ground for hit-and-run attacks.