Suspected Jemaah Islamiyah member nabbed in Compostela Valley

MANILA, Philippines - Army Scout Rangers captured a suspected Jemaah Islamiyah member after a shootout with gunmen in Compostela Valley on Sunday.

However, the suspect, who identified himself as Giovanni de Ocampo, told military interrogators that he was a Moro Islamic Liberation Front commander in Barangay Napnapan in Pantukan town.

But Lt. Col. Kurt Decapia, Army 10th infantry division public affairs chief based in Davao City, said De Ocampo was a trainor in manufacturing improvised explosive devices used in killing civilians and destroying property in the Davao Region.

De Ocampo’s capture has preempted another plot to bomb Mindanao, particularly the cities of Davao, General Santos, and Kidapawan, he added.

Decapia said troops were responding to reports of armed men in the area when they engaged the suspected terrorists in a shootout.

Troops found an M79 grenade launcher with live ammunition, four IED’s with four 81-millimeter mortar rounds, a two-way radio, binoculars, wires and firing mechanism, assorted bomb parts, a pistol magazine and personal belongings at the scene, he added.

Decapia said De Ocampo is now in the custody of the 2nd Scout Ranger Battalion for debriefing. “Police are completing the documents for De Ocampo’s inquest and the filing of appropriate charges against him,” he said.

The Indonesia-based JI is believed to have sent experts to the Philippines to train local terrorists.

Two of its bomb experts, Indonesians Dulmatin and Umar Patek, who are believed to be hiding with the Abu Sayyaf, have been the subjects of a massive military manhunt since 2006.

The two are believed to have masterminded the October 2002 bombing of two nightclubs in Bali, Indonesia that killed more than 200 people, mostly Australians.            – James Mananghaya