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Philippines MILF Step-Up War Efforts
by Kazi Mahmood
JAKARTA (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - While the Philippines senate is gearing up for the trial of President Joseph Estrada, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) has stepped-up war efforts in the southern Philippines.
The MILF on Saturday ambushed two buses carrying civilians in Takepan village, while another unit commandeered a truck in the nearby village of Dalengawen and used it to block a road.
This prompted the Philippine troops to launch a manhunt Sunday for some 200 MILF members. The army claims six people were killed and 18 wounded in recent attacks in the southern province of North Cotabato, military officials said.
"Soldiers are pursuing the MILF forces without let-up. They have orders to neutralize the terrorists," southern command spokesman Col. Fredesvindo Covarrubias said.
At least five MILF members and a soldier were killed and five other soldiers were wounded when fighting broke out with military reinforcements arriving. Cotabato is virtually on the alert with the renewed war efforts by the MILF, officials say.
The soldier was killed and the five were wounded in a firefight between fleeing MILF and arriving government troops at the ambush site. This was not the only attack led by the MILF in the southern Philippines during the last week.
The movement was active in Barangay were they tried to kidnap a Chinese businesswoman who was saved by Philippines troops, reports indicate.
The military reported that the 38th Infantry Battalion troopers are tracking the MILF who fled towards the mountainous area of Barangay Dalengaoen dragging along with them eight agricultural farm animals taken from villagers.
The report said as the MILF members fled, they held hostage some residents of Barangay Dalengaoen to thwart off pursuing troopers.
Fleeing MILF members fired indiscriminately, killing five civilians and injuring three others. The fighters also burned two houses and carted away eight caribou and cows.
MILF members ambushed two Weena passenger buses around 5:00 a.m. along the Barangay Dalengaoen highway that resulted in injuries to nine passengers. The passenger buses were bound for Cotabato City from Davao City when ambushed.
Authorities, both the police and the military, have tightened security along Dalengaoen highway to thwart off a possible repeat incident.
MG-250 attack helicopters are conducting air reconnaissance from time to time as more military troops are on their way to North Upi to support troops deployed there.
Last Monday, notorious MILF leader Kumander Bravo led an unsuccessful attack in Kauswagan, Lanao del Norte which left three of his men dead.
Another encounter was reported last Monday between the military and the MILF in San Isidro, Bagumbayan, Kauswagan town.
Bravo reportedly led about 50 heavily armed men in launching a surprise attack on the military's detachment in the area. The soldiers, however, were prepared for combat after receiving intelligence reports of the MILF operation.
A group of 100 MILF fighters also stormed General Santos City jail on Monday to rescue MILF Commander Tahir Alonto. At least 68 detainees were able to escape after the attack.
Eid Kabalu, MILF spokesperson, would not confirm nor deny the reports about the increase in guerilla tactics but admitted that there are MILF fighters operating in Upi, an upland town south of Cotabato City, and in Barangay.
"MILF guerrillas only target military positions, vehicles, detachments in carrying out their offensives," MILF spokesman Eid Kabalu said, rebutting Philippine military claims that the MILF was a terrorist group attacking civilians.
A kidnapping gang linked to the MILF is still holding Arthur Yap, 40, a trader whom the gang seized on All Saints’ Day.
The gang, led by a certain Mayangcang Saguile, is demanding a ransom from the family of Yap. The military said this was an example of the MILF’s terrorist activities.
The attacks come amid efforts to revive peace talks between the government and the MILF that collapsed when Estrada ordered an all-out war against the group.
MILF leaders said one of their conditions for a resumption of the talks is for the military to return to the guerrilla’s dozens of camps overrun by government soldiers.
The government has not responded to MILF demands, but officials were quoted as saying that the government was bent on convincing the MILF to return to the negotiating table.
The MILF has resorted to guerrilla tactics following the military’s occupation of its camps in various parts of Mindanao. According to the military, the MILF tried to build new camps in other areas.
The MILF was left out in a peace agreement that the government signed with the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) in September 1996.
The agreement provided for the expansion of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, which MNLF chair Nur Misuari now heads as governor.
It also created the Southern Philippines Council for Peace and Development (SPCD) to oversee the implementation of projects that were designed to promote peace in Mindanao.
The SPCPD, however, ran smack into opposition from politicians in the region, who harbored distrust of Misuari and the MNLF
But even with the capture of the 10,000-hectare MILF enclave, MILF forces have not ceased launching clandestine attacks against Army and Marine combatants guarding the area, using surrounding forests as springboards for their tactical maneuvers.
The MILF is the country's largest remaining Muslim fighting group and has waged a 22-year rebellion for an independent Islamic state in the south.
Peace talks with the group collapsed earlier this year when troops routed its main headquarters and the government slapped huge bounties on its leaders. The MILF has declared a jihad (holy struggle) against the Philippines government.
Peace talks between the government and the MILF may not resume in the next few months observers told IslamOnline.
"Both sides are good only at giving assurances they are ready to resume the talks and this has been going on for months now," commented Datu Michael Sinsuat, mayor of Upi, Maguindanao and president of the league of mayors of the province.
Al-Haj Murad, MILF’s vice chair for military affairs, said they are ready to reactivate their peace panel once the government will agree "in black and white" to the holding of the negotiations abroad.
"We can form our peace panel in 24 hours once we have that document," Murad told The STAR, a Filipino daily, through a two-way radio.
MILF chieftain Salamat Hashim disbanded their peace panel last August, about three weeks after soldiers overrun Camp Abubakar, the front’s last bastion on the border of Maguindanao and Lanao del Sur.
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