Soldiers discover 3 more lairs of Datu Piang blast suspects

CAMP SIONGCO, Maguindanao — Soldiers running after a band of Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) guerrillas implicated in the Dec. 24 bombing in Datu Piang, Maguindanao, discovered three more rebel positions surrounding the town the other day, but found no traces of the elusive group.

Capt. Onting Alon, deputy civil relations chief of the Army’s 6th Infantry Division, said the group of Commander Rambo, the alleged mastermind of the bombing that left Datu Piang Mayor Saudi Ampatuan and 17 other people dead, may have fled to the nearby Liguasan Marsh, a known lair of lawless elements.

Alon said combined elements of the 6th ID and 301st Infantry Brigade found the three abandoned, fortified guerrilla positions after expanding their pursuit by a radius of 10 more kilometers from the town proper of Datu Piang.

He said soldiers found in one of the rebel lairs more than a dozen B-40 anti-tank rockets and notebooks containing handwritten diagrams for making homemade bombs and a list of incendiary chemicals used in fabricating explosives.

Rambo and his followers, Alon said, could now be in a secluded area of the Liguasan Marsh, protected by criminal gangs operating there.

Alon said Maj. Gen. Generoso Senga, commander of the 6th ID, has fielded more intelligence agents in towns surrounding the 220,000-hectare Liguasan Marsh at the boundary of Maguindanao, North Cotabato and Sultan Kudarat, to help track down Rambo’s group.

Presidential Assistant for Mindanao Jesus Dureza, who chairs the government panel negotiating peace with the MILF, said the joint ceasefire monitoring teams start today their inquiry into the extent of the alleged involvement of MILF forces in the Datu Piang bombing.

Last Tuesday, Dureza assured Maguindanao Gov. Datu Andal Ampatuan, father of the slain Datu Piang mayor, that both teams would help the police and the military build a strong case against the people responsible for the carnage.

The blast also killed the governor’s son-in-law, Nash Macapendeg, the municipal treasurer of Datu Piang.

The MILF, for more than a week now, has been criticizing the military’s continuing operations against Rambo and his men, some of them long wanted for various criminal offenses, including kidnapping and extortion.

Col. Agustin Dema-ala, commander of the 301st IB, said his units pursuing Rambo’s group were merely carrying out "police actions" against the bombing suspects.