Kato's men attack Army intel agent

COTABATO CITY – Two followers of wanted Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) leader Ameril Ombra Kato hurled grenades at a decorated Army intelligence agent helping track him down in Kabacan, North Cotabato yesterday.

Inspector Franklin Anito, chief of the Carmen municipal police, said the soldier, whom he declined to identify due to the nature of his work, suffered bruises in the attack.

Anito said the Army agent was standing in front of a store along the national highway in Kabacan, a booming town of mixed Muslim and Christian settlers, when two motorcycle-riding men pulled over and hurled grenades at his direction.

The Army agent, who belongs to the 602nd Infantry Brigade in nearby Carmen town, managed to duck for cover when he saw the grenades rolling toward him.

The explosions triggered panic in the town proper of Kabacan, according to Anito.

He said armed men twice attempted to kill the same Army agent in Pikit town last year.

“He’s a dedicated, hardworking Army plainclothes operative. He is known personally to members of the Kabacan police force because he has been very helpful in gathering information on crimes that happen in the town,” Anito said.

Col. Julieto Ando, spokesman of the Army’s 6th Infantry Division, said they have received feedback from informants in Kabacan and surrounding towns that the two men who attempted to kill the intelligence agent were followers of Kato, chief of the MILF’s 105th Base Command.

“That agent played a big role in locating the whereabouts of Kato and his men when they plundered and occupied for many weeks more than 10 barangays at the boundary of (North Cotabato’s) Midsayap and Aleosan municipalities last August,” Ando said.