Top CPP leader caught in Pampanga

CAMP AQUINO, Tarlac – Police and Army troops captured a suspected top official of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) during a raid in a rebel hideout in Angeles City Thursday night.

Maj. Gen. Rodolfo Garcia, Armed Forces Northern Luzon Command chief, said Mario Pangilinan, alias Ka Roel, was the secretary general of the CPP Central Luzon regional party committee, as well as a ranking official of the Northwestern Pampanga Guerrilla Front of the New People’s Army (NPA).

Pangilinan was arrested in Barangay Cutud by troops of the 69th Infantry Brigade under Maj. Gen. Alberto Braganza, commander of the 7th Infantry Division, he added.

Braganza said his men seized from Pangilinan a laptop computer, an ICOM radio transceiver, a caliber .38 revolver, and two grenades.

Garcia presented Pangilinan to Armed Forces chief Gen. Benjamin Defensor yesterday.

Defensor said the arrest of Pangilinan has dealt a big blow to the rebel movement in Central Luzon, which has been the NPA’s stronghold for three decades.

"The communist ideology has not only become passé but also fossilized," he said.

Defensor said the government remains steadfast that the US classification of the CPP as a foreign terrorist organization has been favorable to the country.

"The CPP-NPA is indeed a terrorist organization," he said. "The Philippine government supports the US-led campaign not only against the communist movement but other terrorist organizations as well."

Defensor said the NPA is already a "spent force" and that the military has been "definitely victorious" in its counter-insurgency campaign.

"What we only need now is to complete the government’s victory against the communist terrorists," he said.

While the military is waging counter-insurgency operations, the government is pursuing peace talks with communist rebel leaders, he added.

Meanwhile, Braganza said the burning of heavy equipment and generators in a quarry in Angat, Bulacan Tuesday was an NPA diversionary tactic to slow down the military offensive against the rebels.

"The Angat incident was a diversionary move due to our relentless operations (against them)," he said. "It is a desperate act due to their inability to force taxation on the quarry operators." – Benjie Villa, Paolo Romero