DAVAO CITY – Suspected communist rebels stormed a mining company office and burned equipment, and fatally shot a policeman and wounded three soldiers in stepped-up attacks, police said yesterday.
New People’s Army (NPA) rebels, who quit peace talks four years ago to end their decades-long insurgency, locked up employees of the Philco Mining Corp. in Barangay Camanlangan in New Bataan, Compostela Valley on Tuesday and set fire to a generator and other equipment, said Chief Superintendent Andres Caro II, Southern Mindanao police director.
Caro said the attack was triggered by the company’s refusal to pay extortion demands to the rebels, who are considered terrorists by the United States and European countries because they target civilians and commercial establishments.
Civilian auxiliary units and the barangay police pursued the insurgents as they fled toward the neighboring town of Maragusan.
There were no casualties, but on Monday, police blamed the rebels for wounding three soldiers in Northern Samar during a two-hour gunfight.
Four suspected rebels shot dead a police sergeant who was securing a public market in Cateel, Davao Oriental Sunday, said SPO Ireneo Poblete.
He said the rebels fled on a motorbike with a caliber 9-mm pistol taken from the slain officer.
Last week, three people were killed and 11 wounded when the rebels lobbed a grenade at a bakeshop in Compostela Valley, reportedly after owners ignored their extortion letters.
The NPA guerrillas have carted away nearly 200 firearms from police and military installations in Southern Mindanao, the latest of which was the raid last week on the police station in Banay-Banay, Davao Oriental.
In a statement last week, the rebels said recent tactical offensives were meant to punish the administration of President Arroyo for “despicable crimes of large-scale corruption, imperialist plunder and fascist atrocities.”
The rebels, thought to be numbering about 5,000 to 7,000, have become more active in recent months, attacking remote military and police outposts to seize badly needed weapons.
The President has ordered the military to defeat them by the time she steps down in 2010. – Edith Regalado and AP