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A car bomb went off in central Bogotá at 5:30 Thursday morning, injuring 9 people. It is believed that the target was the nearby headquarters of the Caracol radio network. President Juan Manuel Santos did not immediately blame it on the FARC guerrillas. A pro-FARC website claims the attack was carried out not by guerrillas but by “mafias,” though the methods resemble those used in the 2003 bombing of the El Nogal social club a few blocks away, a crime the FARC also denied but was later revealed to have committed. The “La Silla Vacía” website lays out the cases for why the bombing might be, or might not be, the work of the FARC: “Some believe that it was evidently the FARC, since the attack fit within its modus operandi and its motives. Others, on the contrary, believe that it is a message from the extreme right that Juan Manuel Santos must not move away from the uribista hard line, and that Santos must not open a space for negotiations with the guerrillas.”

Venezuela and Colombia re-established diplomatic relations this week after a meeting between Presidents Chávez and Santos. It remains unclear how the two countries will deal with the issue that has detonated several past crises between the two countries: the presence of FARC guerrillas in Venezuelan territory. Asked by El Tiempo whether there will be “verification of the guerrilla presence in Venezuela,” Colombian Foreign Minister María Ángela Holguín replied, “No. Verification, no. We are looking forward.”

Asked a series of “questions for the record” by Sen. Richard Lugar, U.S. Ambassador-Designate to Venezuela Larry Palmer answered very frankly, using language stronger than the State Department has in the past. (“The Venezuelan government has been unwilling to prevent Colombian guerillas [sic.] from entering and establishing camps in Venezuelan territory. … [Military] morale is reported to be considerably low, particularly due to politically-oriented appointments. … As Cuba and Venezuela increase their military-to-military ties, I am concerned that Cuba’s influence within the Venezuelan military will grow.”) As a result, Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez has announced that Palmer is not welcome in Caracas. The Washington Post editorial page contends that it would be better for the United States not to have an ambassador at all.

On Tuesday, Colombia’s Constitutional Court will decide whether the country’s new defense agreement with the United States, signed last October, is truly constitutional. The court may require Colombia’s Congress to vote to approve it. Sources tell “La Silla Vacía” that a majority of justices are likely to rule against the agreement.

Starting next month, former Colombian President Álvaro Uribe will be a Distinguished Scholar in the Practice of Global Leadership at Georgetown University.

The new head of Colombia’s armed forces is a Navy admiral for only the second time ever. “La Silla Vacía” (linked for a third time in today’s post) has profiles of President Santos’ new high command. “These men,” reporter Dora Montero writes, “don’t follow the same line as the former high command – led by Gen. Freddy Padilla – that accompanied President Álvaro Uribe for years, and was seen by the rest of the military as more ‘political’ than ‘military.’ … The troops perceive this group of generals as closer to them.” Part of this “closeness,” Montero explains, is a likely willingness to defend the force more fiercely against accusations of human rights abuse.

The U.S. Defense Security Cooperation Agency notified Congress [PDF] of a possible $162 million sale of nine Blackhawk helicopters to Colombia’s Army, Police and Air Force. Already, “Colombia operates the world’s third-largest BLACK HAWK helicopter fleet,” according to the aircraft’s manufacturer, Connecticut-based Sikorsky Aircraft Corporation.

Three and a half years after adopting a hard-line approach to drug-related violence, Mexican President Felipe Calderón “finally accepted that the strategy had failed to rein in the cartels,” as The Guardian put it. “I know that the strategy has been questioned, and my administration is more than willing to revise, strengthen or change it if needed,” he said in a meeting with opposition leaders this week. Security Secretary Genaro García Luna blamed Mexico’s severe public security setbacks on “at least 30 years of structural abandonment of the country’s police forces.” The Associated Press obtained data indicating a badly broken judicial system: “only about 15 percent of drug suspects detained between December 2006 and September 2009 have been convicted or acquitted.” The Washington Post covered one strategic change currently underway: a $270 million program of new social spending in Ciudad Juárez, the most violent city in the hemisphere. On his blog, meanwhile, former President Vicente Fox called for the legalization of drugs.

Ecuador’s El Universo writes about the cocaine trade along the country’s Pacific border with Colombia: “Here, an arroba [about 25 pounds] of coca seeds is sold for US$100, according to the campesinos. 40 arrobas can plant a hectare. The crops begin to produce within three months, and every arroba of coca leaf sells for US$15; a hectare produces 70 arrobas. After processing, the growers make basic cocaine paste. 40 arrobas of leaves make a kilo of paste, which in this zone sells for US$1,100.” Elsewhere on the border, in Ecuador’s north-central province of Carchi, El Universo contends that greater government presence has reduced the threat posed by guerrillas and other Colombian armed groups.

Suriname’s former dictator Desi Bouterse, wanted in the Netherlands for narcotrafficking and on trial at home for a 1982 mass murder, was inaugurated as the country’s President on Thursday. A week earlier, reports the U.S. Southern Command, “Six U.S. Army medical personnel traveled to Paramaribo, Suriname, to exchange medical procedures with 45-medical personnel from the Suriname Armed Forces.”

Sixteen U.S. military officers, including seven generals, paid a visit to Managua “to strengthen relations with the Nicaraguan army,” reports La Prensa. Meanwhile, McClatchy reports, “entities controlled by Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega have received at least $1 billion in no-strings-attached donations through an oil deal brokered by President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela.”

The costs of earthquake rebuilding will force Chile to cut its defense budget next year, President Sebastián Piñera explained to the high command.

Argentina’s foreign minister, Héctor Timerman, visited Washington and met with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs Arturo Valenzuela will be in China next week for “the fourth round of U.S - China sub-dialogues on Latin America.”

As Brazil’s October 3 elections draw nearer, The Economist reports that Dilma Rouseff, the candidate of President Lula da Silva’s Workers’ Party, is polling at 41 percent, nearly 10 points ahead of opponent José Serra. Earlier in the week, Serra angered Bolivia’s government by claiming that President Evo Morales’s administration has been “lazy with regard to controlling cocaine.” Serra said in May that 80 or 90 percent of cocaine that arrives in Brazil comes from Bolivia; Brazil’s police offer a figure of 59 percent.

A recent poll places Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa’s approval rating at 37 percent. Though Ecuador and Colombia still have not re-established diplomatic relations after a 2008 crisis, Correa attended the August 7 inauguration of Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos, and urged Santos to visit Quito “quickly.”

A corruption scandal forced the resignation of the chief of Uruguay’s navy, Adm. Oscar Debali.