2 hurt in Maguindanao town blast

COTABATO CITY, Philippines --   Unidentified motorcycle-riding men blasted a fragmentation grenade at the house here of a municipal treasurer in Maguindanao, injuring a Moro couple, about  10 hours  after four powerful explosions rocked Shariff Aguak town in the province.

Investigators are still clueless on the culprit behind the bombing of the house of Norodin Samaon, treasurer of Maguindanao’s Talitay town, and the motive for the attack.

No one was hurt in the grenade attack, but the incident triggered panic in the surroundings of Samaon’s house in a residential area here.

The motorcycle-riding members sped away and disappeared even before responding policemen could reach the scene.

The incident came hours after four powerful explosions rocked different spots in the town proper of Shariff Aguak in the second district of Maguindanao.

Senior Supt. Rudelio Jocson, Maguindanao’s provincial police director,  said investigators and their intelligence operatives are still gathering information to  determine the culprits in the Shariff Aguak incident.

Local officials said there were indications that the explosives used in the bombings were shoulder-fire 40 MM projectiles.

One of the grenade shells, landed on the roof of a house owned by a certain Ali Silongan Kuli, 20.

Kuli and his wife, Hanna, who were both wounded in the explosion, were rushed by responding policemen and soldiers to a hospital for medication.

Col. Dickson Hermoso, public affairs chief of the Army’s 6th Infantry Division, said the intelligence agents of military units in Shariff Aguak and surrounding towns are helping the police investigate on the Shariff Aguak incident.

Hermoso said Army and police bomb disposal experts found an unexploded anti-tank rocket not far from the scene.

The powerful rocket, which has an effective 50-meter blast impact radius, has been disposed of.  - John Unson