MAGUINDANAO – At least 16 rebels and soldiers were killed in new clashes in Maguindanao in the troubled Muslim autonomous region in southern Philippines, officials said Monday.
Capt. Jo-ann Petinglay, a spokeswoman for the 6th Infantry Division, said among those slain were four army soldiers, who fought off Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters in the towns of Datu Unsay, Datu Ampatuan and Shariff Saydona over the weekend.
She said a notorious rebel leader known only as Commander Bisaya was killed along with two relatives of another senior BIFF leader Commander Karialan, whose group ambushed a military convoy escorting an ambulance transporting wounded soldiers in Elian village in Datu Saudi Ampatuan.
More than a dozen gunmen and soldiers were also wounded in the fighting, she said, adding, security forces resumed the operations against the BIFF forces on Monday.
She said Maj. Gen. Edmundo Pangilinan, the division commander, ordered troops to continue without letup the campaign against the rebel group blamed for the spate of attacks and bombings in the region.
“General Pangilinan ordered troops to continue pursuing what was left of the BIFF after the month-long law enforcement operation,” Petinglay told the regional newspaper Mindanao Examiner.
She also quoted Pangilinan as saying: “Let us not give the bandits a chance to reorganize and regroup so that they cannot continue conducting terror activities in the communities.”
Troops were battling the BIFF the past weeks now after the military ordered an all-out offensive against the small group that broke away with the larger Moro Islamic Liberation Front which signed a peace deal with Manila last year.
It was unknown if troops recovered any of the slain rebels, but most of the military reports were based on intelligence provided by villagers in those towns.
The BIFF continues to fight for an independent Muslim state in Mindanao. (Mark Navales, Rose Muneza and Cris Jay Diaz)
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