COTABATO CITY (Mindanao Examiner / July 16, 2013) – A Southern Philippine school on Tuesday suspended its primary classes due to the presence of huge number of government troops hunting down Moro rebels.
The Mindanao Human Rights Action Center (MinHRAC) reported that troops assembled at the Bagan Elementary School in the town of Guindulungan in Maguindanao province.
The town was scene of recent clashes between army soldiers and Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters that triggered an exodus of civilians.
MinHRAC said the presence of troops in the school compound interrupted the classes and that soldiers had told the students to go home.
“Troops assembled at Bagan Elementary School in Barangay Bagan, Guindulungan, Maguindanao, causing interruption of the classes and then sending home of the students. As of this writing, the AFP forces are conducting clearing operations at Barangay Kateman, Guindulungan,” agency said in a bulletin sent to the regional newspaper Mindanao Examiner.
Just last month, MinHRAC reported that troops arrested 8 innocent civilians in Sultan Kudarat on suspicion they were rebels. They were seized by army soldiers while trying to get their belongings in the village of Kulasi where rebels and soldiers had clashed.
It said those arrested were villagers who fled the fighting, but the military said the group was carrying explosives, an accusation strongly denied by the victims.
Zainudin Malang, MinHRAC executive director, said those arrested were civilians displaced by the fighting in the village and that they were taken by soldiers while on their way to briefly go to their homes to get their belongings. (Mindanao Examiner)
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