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Army Outposts Attacked in Philippines
With additional reporting by Kazi Mahmood
JAKARTA, Dec. 27 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Some 400 combatants belonging to breakaway groups of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) and Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) attacked three military detachments in Maguindanao Wednesday, killing three people.
The fresh outbreak of violence may be the beginning of a new secessionist group, sources in Manila said Thursday.
The combatants simultaneously attacked Philippine military detachments in Barangay Makulot in Sultan sa Barongis, Maguindanao.
Government troops repulsed the attackers after heavy exchanges of gunfire, although there were still sporadic firefights as a result of the military's pursuit operations later in the day.
At least three persons - two attackers and a soldier - were killed, while another soldier was wounded in the initial encounter, a Philippine military report said.
Local army sources dismissed the possibility that the group could be linked to former Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao Governor Nur Misuari, who is in jail in Malaysia.
However, there are reports of an alliance between breakaway factions from the MILF and MNLF joining forces with the Abu Sayyaf kidnap gang and the Pentagon gang, another famous kidnap gang in Mindanao.
Nevertheless, the military said the attackers were not the same ones who were involved in the series of assaults in Sulu last November.
The attackers, led by one Commander Gray, are not identified with the MILF or the MNLF.
Meanwhile, reports also said the "Pentagon" has spread its wings in Central Mindanao with the intent to carry out further kidnappings of foreigners and locals for ransom.
The Pentagon group, led by an individual named Pentagon, has merged as an intricate band of kidnappers-for-ransom gang in Mindanao.
The group, led by the slippery Tahir Alonto (Pentagon), a former MILF member, has claimed responsibility for more than 20 kidnappings in the region in the past seven months.
Since 1990, Central Mindanao has not experienced any lull in kidnappings in the region, pioneered by Abogado Bago, also known as Commander Mubarak, a MNLF member.
Philippine Marines gunned down Mubarak in a raid on his hideout in a secluded district in Pantukan, Davao del Norte on Dec. 7, 1992, after having masterminded the abductions of 70 wealthy residents, mostly Filipino-Chinese traders, in Central Mindanao.
The Pentagon surfaced in July when its members abducted, in separate attacks in North Cotabato and Maguindanao, five Chinese nationals and their Filipino interpreter.
Two of the captives, Zhang Zhung Quiang and Xue Xing, were killed by their captors during a chance encounter with soldiers in Lambayong, Sultan Kudarat on August 11.
A third captive, Wang Shengli, escaped while both sides were trading fire.
The two remaining captives, Zhang Zhung Yi and Edwin Lim, a Davao City businessman, were freed one after the other in October through the intercession of Libyan Ambassador Salem Adam and Cotabato City Mayor Muslimin Sema.
The Pentagon now has a small training camp in Central Mindanao, military sources said, adding that the first batch of Pentagon recruits, who graduated from the training camp last September, were 29 adolescents, who underwent extensive training in fabrication of homemade bombs and handling of firearms.
The recruits were also reportedly taught Arabic.
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