DAVAO CITY (Mindanao Examiner / June 9, 2012) – Communist rebels raided two mining firms and attacked government troops pursuing them Saturday in the southern Philippines, officials said.
Officials said undetermined number of New People’s Army rebels raided the Milagrosa mining firm after disarming private guards at around 1 a.m. in the village called Saranga in Compostela Valley’s Maragusan town.
Troops sent to pursue the raiders resulted in a fire fight after gunmen detonated a landmine in the village of Nuevo Visayas in the nearby town of Mawab, but there were no reports of casualties, according to Major Rosa Maria Cristina Manuel, of the 10th Infantry Division.
She said the rebels earlier raided the Philco mining company in the village of Camanlangan in the neighboring town of New Bataan and burned two excavating equipment, and two trucks and a driller before fleeing under cover of darkness.
“There is an operation going on against the NPA in the province,” Manuel told the Mindanao Examiner.
The military has condemned the continued use of landmines by the rebels, saying it put the lives of civilians in grave dangers.
“Landmines are totally banned around the world, but the NPA continues to use those explosives that endanger the lives of innocent civilians. We totally condemned the use of landmines,” she said.
The NPA, which is fighting for decades for the establishment of a Maoist state in the country, is opposed to mining operations in Mindanao, saying it is destroying the environment. But the military said the attacks were triggered by refusals of mining firms to pay so-called “revolutionary taxes.” (Mindanao Examiner)
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