RP-US anti-terror alliance yielding solid results

WASHINGTON – The United States trained 4,197 police personnel in 10 police stations throughout the Philippines and supported the country’s military with intelligence, reconnaissance and surveillance reports in operations against terrorists in Mindanao last year, the US State Department said.

This pro-active partnership with the Philippine government has yielded solid results in combating terrorist elements, including the Abu Sayyaf Group, the Indonesian-based Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) and the communist New People’s Army, the State Department said in its Country Reports on Terrorism 2008.

It said Filipino security forces killed 35 terrorists and captured 16 in the first half of 2008.

The report released on Thursday said Philippine military and law enforcement agencies conducted intensive civil-military and internal security operations to eliminate terrorist safe havens in the Sulu archipelago and central Mindanao.

It said a strategic government program to set up coast watch stations in the southern Philippines to monitor suspected terrorist groups and other criminal elements operating along the waters bordering the Philippines, Malaysia and Indonesia was continuing to move forward.

“The Coast Watch South program will dramatically improve oversight of the tri-border ‘Terrorist Transit Triangle’ with the use of 12-17 coastal radar sites connected by a string of air, ocean, and ground surveillance and interdiction assets, including Forward-Looking Infrared Radar (FLIR) pods for Philippine Navy aircraft and 10 rigid-hull inflatable boats (RHIBs),” the report said.

The US Department of Homeland Security has provided the Philippine National Police with fingerprints, photographs and other information on 130 suspected terrorists.

At the same time the US Anti Terrorism Assistance (ATA) program continues to increase the ability of law enforcement agencies to detect, deter, counter and investigate terrorist activities in the Philippines, the report added.