A Cancer in Colombia

Here’s what terrorists targeted this time: a kids’ party and a little girl’s ballet recital.

The car bomb attack on a Bogota nightclub Friday killed six children and at least 27 adults and wounded 160 or more other civilians. (So much for courage.)

Many of the dead were prominent and wealthy. Others -- a cook, a barman, several waiters -- weren’t. (So much for this being a people’s campaign.)

The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC -- the narco-guerrilla group that has terrorized Colombia for more than four decades -- has not yet claimed responsibility for the bombing. But the United States has said the attack appears to be “part of a FARC urban terrorism campaign,” and an editorial in the respected Colombian newspaper El Tiempo also fingers FARC, saying the latest attack follows the pattern set by a rocket attack on the presidential palace and a hotel restaurant bombing.

Indeed, a Web site used by the guerrillas suggests they targeted the luxurious nightclub because it was “the frequent site of meetings between political and business sectors [and] spokesmen for paramilitaries.” This slaughter strategy is the legacy of drug lords such as Pablo Escobar, who, threatened with extradition to the United States in 1989, planted car bombs in public places, killing scores of innocent people.

Last week’s attack was a FARC attempt to intimidate President Alvaro Uribe and make the Colombian people think his government is vulnerable. The guerrillas want to force Uribe to soften his military offensive against them in the countryside. And they want to gain the upper hand in possible negotiations, in which they hope to exchange people they have kidnapped for comrades the government has jailed.

Initially, Uribe appeared hesitant to blame the blasts on FARC. To his credit, he has now joined the chorus attributing the killings to that organization and has urged the leaders of five Latin American nations to label the guerrillas as terrorists -- something the U.S. did long ago.

Now Uribe must stand firm and the Colombian people must stand behind him, until the kidnappings, car bombings and child killings end.