105 killed in Colombian fighting

Rescue workers carry a wounded resident of Bojaya upon her arrival to the airport in Medellin, Colombia Saturday.

QUIBDO, Colombia (CNN) -- Three days of fighting between Marxist rebels and right-wing paramilitary forces has left 105 people dead and at least 145 others missing, many of them feared dead, the head of Colombia's air ambulance service said.

It's one of the heaviest tolls from a single battle in Colombia's 38 years of civil war.

Of the approximately 90 civilians injured in the fighting, the official said 17 were evacuated from the remote northwest area Saturday, but the air ambulance pilots said they would not return to pick up the rest Sunday because fresh fighting had broken out.

The Associated Press reports that 38 children have been killed in the fighting.

Fighting was centered in Bojaya, a village of about 1,000 residents on the banks of the Atrato, one of Colombia's largest rivers, said David Emilio Mosquera, acting provincial governor of Choco Province.

EXTRA INFORMATION Map of the fighting area in Colombia

The area, about 100 miles from the border with Panama and 250 miles northwest of the capital city of Bogota, is considered a strategic portal from the jungles of Colombia's Pacific coast to the Gulf of Uraba. It is also a region used by gun and drug smugglers.

Mosquera said most of the fighting was taking place inside the village, with other skirmishes in nearby rural areas.

Neither the military nor police have reached the area, which is accessible only by light aircraft or boat, Mosquera said.

A spokesman for the International Red Cross in Bogota said delegates of the organization had not entered the combat zone because of security concerns.

FARC controls a large area of Colombia

Bojaya was also the scene of fierce fighting in March 2000, when guerrilla forces attacked a police post they accused of supporting paramilitary gunmen.

The left-wing Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, known by the Spanish acronym FARC, and the right-wing paramilitary alliance United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia, or AUC, have been battling for control of the remote northwestern region for several years as part of Colombia's civil war.

The AUC is a coalition of paramilitary groups that are staunchly anti-communist and are engaged in fighting left-wing guerrillas and their suspected civilian sympathizers.

International human rights groups have consistently accused the military of backing the outlawed paramilitary forces in a joint counterinsurgency effort. The military denies those ties.