| Gunmen killed a Venezuelan oil engineer and six soldiers near the border with Colombia in an attack that officials suspected was carried out by Colombian rebels. The engineer, a 23-year-old woman working with the state-run oil company, and the soldiers were killed Friday afternnon as troops escorted a group of nine civilians near one of the rivers that form the boundary between Venezuela and Colombia, said Venezuelan Defense Minister Jorge Garcia Carneiro. Another civilian and soldier were wounded in the attack near La Victoria, a town 430 miles southwest of Caracas. Garcia Carneiro said Friday night that authorities have not yet identified which armed group was behind the killings and how many people participated in the attack. But Colombian rebels were suspected, he said. Defense on the border was being reinforced after the incident with 60 more troops, three helicopters and two F-16 fighter jets. Venezuela's 1,400-mile border with Colombia is often plagued with violence stemming from Colombia's four-decade civil war between leftist rebels, government troops and outlawed right-wing paramilitary groups. Both countries have accused each other of not doing enough to guard the border, which runs through steep mountains and thick, tropical jungle. |