Batangas City – As part of its effort to fight terrorism in Southern Tagalog, Coast Guard personnel seized thousands of materials used in making explosives stacked in a vehicle bound for Iloilo at the Batangas Port yesterday.
Lt. Commander Troy Cornelio, Batangas station commander of the Coast Guard, said 6,100 blasting caps and 3,050 time fuses were found by their K-9 units and Batangas boarding team personnel inside a Ceres Bus with license plate FWM-949 during a random check on M/V Ursula of Montenegro Shipping Lines.
Cornelio said the shipment was discovered in a bus compartment by a two-year-old Labrador K-9 dog named “Sea Woman Courage” handled by Coast Guard Seaman 2nd Taylor Paday-os.
Cornelio said the seized blasting caps and time fuses could be used for illegal fishing or worse, for terrorist attacks.
Cornelio told The STAR the materials can also be used in mining but the user must first secure the necessary documents.
He said they tried to call the cell phone number indicated on the box containing the seized materials but nobody answered the call.
Commodore Cecil Chen, Southern Tagalog district commander of the Coast Guard, quoted the bus driver, a certain Abner Chan, and conductor Reymel Libuna as saying that somebody could just pick up the shipment in Iloilo.
“This operation is part of our ongoing effort in instituting appropriate security measures in the port area of Batangas and vessels bound for nearby provinces” Chen said.
Chen said the confiscated items are stored at the Coast Guard’s Batangas headquarters for proper disposition.