4 killed, 9 wounded in Moro reb attacks

COTABATO CITY — Four civilians were killed and nine others were wounded in separate attacks by Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) rebels in Sultan Kudarat and North Cotabato the other day.

Capt. Ricardo Ellorda, deputy civil-military relations chief of the Army’s 6th Infantry Division, said four civilians were killed in the first incident, all residents of President Quirino, a farming town some 20 kilometers northwest of Sultan Kudarat’s provincial capitol.

Ellorda identified the fatalities as spouses Joel and Narcisa Santiago, Arnold Gatchalian and Reynaldo Agustin, who were on their way to the town proper from their barangay on board two motorcycles when the rebels blocked their path and fired at them.

Two bystanders, Rowena Viran and Vicente Lumanga, were hit by stray bullets.

Another ambush followed, not far from the scene of the first incident, which left five others seriously wounded.

The victims, siblings Dionisio and Virgilio Bautista, Elizabeth Advincula, Almirah Antonio and Narciso Sablay, were on board a light farm truck when the rebels raked them with M-16 and M-14 gunfire.

Ellorda said intelligence operatives of the 6th ID are now hot on the trail of those responsible for the twin attacks, who were last seen fleeing toward a marsh.

Preceding these incidents was a clash between MILF rebels and patrolling soldiers of the 27th Infantry Battalion in the Taguig area of Camp Abubakar, the separatist group’s main enclave now occupied by soldiers after it fell to government control last July 9.

Ellorda said the rebels fled toward a densely forested area at the boundary of Maguindanao and Lanao del Sur after sensing that Army reinforcements had started closing in.

Village officials in Matanog, Maguindanao have confirmed that four rebels, identified as Talib Mansur, Kuwatong Dibiri, Salmo Abdullah and Kimar Macapaar, were killed in the encounter.

Two civilians were also wounded on the same day when MILF rebels attacked an outpost of civilian volunteers in Barangay Salvo, a hostile area in Datu Piang, Maguindanao.

The victims, identified only as Pay Lakim, 20, and Kadil Lakim, 8, were caught in the crossfire when the gunbattle ensued, which waned only after the rebels reportedly ran out of ammunition and fled toward different directions.

As elements of the Army’s 57th Infantry Battalion pursued the fleeing rebels, they stumbled upon a cache of firearms hidden in a makeshift shelter in Barangay Kitapok, also in Datu Piang town.

The firearms — six M-16 Armalite rifles and a caliber 30 Garand rifle — were kept under sacks of rice and corn, according to Ellorda. — John Unson, Roel Pareño