Mud swept over the tiny town of Bendiciones in Valle province on Wednesday after heavy rains.

A local television news reporter who had gone to cover the disaster, Jairo Munoz, added to the toll of missing when a fresh mudslide washed him away and injured his cameraman, colleagues said.

Rescue workers, using earth-moving equipment in the rain, have recovered six bodies and located another two, but a further 30 people were missing, police said.

Hundreds of survivors have been evacuated to the nearby port of Buenaventura.

President Alvaro Uribe said he would visit the disaster area on Friday and the government accused Marxist rebels of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia -- known by its Spanish initials FARC -- of an attack on rescue workers.

About 50 people have been killed and thousands left homeless by flash floods and mudslides so far in Colombia's wet season, which weather forecasters say will last until June.

PHOTO CAPTION

Colombian soldiers walk after a landslide in Bendiciones, Valle del Cauca province, Colombia April 13, 2006. Colombian. (Reuters)