Barira, a hinterland town in the first district of Maguindanao, is not far away from the MILF’s former enclave, Camp Abubakar, now a zone of peace and secured by a brigade-sized Army contingent.
Capt. Antonio Arriba, civil affairs chief of the Army’s 6th Infantry Division, said the rebels, positioned at a strategic spot in Barangay Gadung in Barira, opened fire first on patrolling combatants of the 64th Infantry Battalion.
Arriba said the soldiers were dispatched to the area following reports from villagers that MILF rebels were collecting "revolutionary taxes" from them.
Although outnumbered, the soldiers, backed by militiamen, managed to outmaneuver their ambushers, killing two of them, both described as still adolescents.
Barangay officials confirmed that the fleeing rebels carried three wounded companions, one of them said to be a preacher.
Arriba said soldiers found more than a dozen live B-40 rockets, assorted ammunition and a jungle pack containing military uniforms at the scene of the ambush.
For more than a week now, Arriba said villagers in far-flung areas of Buldon and Barira towns have been complaining that MILF rebels have been demanding "revolutionary taxes" from them and threatening to harm them should they refuse.
Soldiers and MILF rebels in Maguindanao’s Datu Piang and Shariff Aguak towns, meanwhile, continue to face a standoff, ready to shoot at each other at the slightest provocation.
Arriba said combatants of the 37th and 7th Infantry Battalions succeeded in driving away rebels who had occupied farming villages in the two towns last week, but their snipers kept coming back, targeting soldiers in detachments.