Army: One soldier, five MILF separatists killed in Maguindanao fighting
abs-cbnNEWS.com | 09/13/2008 9:14 PM
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One soldier and five armed separatists have been the latest casualties in fighting Saturday between Army soldiers and a Moro Islamic Liberation Front group in Maguindanao, said the Philippine Army.The clashes started Saturday morning in Datu Saudi Ampatuan town between units of Army’s 601st Infantry Brigade and an MILF group said to be led by MILF Commander Wahid Tondok.
Almost 100 people fled their homes in the area as troops clashed with Muslim separatist rebels, witnesses and the military said Saturday.
The clashes occurred Saturday close to a makeshift center for displaced people in Maguindanao province where US military advisers had visited just an hour earlier.
US forces are in the southern Philippines training local forces to hunt local Muslim extremists linked to the al-Qaeda terror network, although the law bars them from taking part in actual combat.
Army trucks and armored vehicles were seen arriving in the town of Datu Saudi Ampatuan as the fighting escalated.
Hundreds of thousands of people have been displaced by renewed violence on Mindanao, which flared up after the Supreme Court blocked an agreement aimed at ending four decades of sectarian violence.
On Friday, fighting broke out when 100 MILF guerrillas began advancing on civilian communities on Mindanao, regional army spokesman Lt. Col. Roland Bautista told AFP.
The military said up to 20 rebels had died in the violence but no bodies were recovered, while a MILF statement said one guerrilla and 10 soldiers were killed.
The statement accused the Army of attacking its fighters as they prayed in a mosque, a claim denied by the military.
"There is no mosque in that area and we did not attack a mosque like the MILF said," Bautista said.
"Our soldiers stopped their advance," he said, adding that the troops also overran an MILF camp.
The latest violence came after the MILF last month attacked Christian villages across Mindanao, killing civilians and burning homes.
Fighting between government troops and the MILF has reached its worst point in five years, according to the International Committee of the Red Cross.
The organization has asked the government and MILF to allow it access to displaced civilians, many of them sheltering in poorly-provisioned camps. With reports from Ren Tangonan, ABS-CBN Cotabato and Agence France-Presse
