Southeast Asia |
Philippine Troops Prepare to Arrest Suspects in Basilan Attack |
2007-07-30 |
Government troops stepped up security patrols yesterday in the southern island of Basilan in preparation for a campaign to arrest rebels behind the July 10 killing of 14 Marines, ten of them beheaded. More than 2,000 soldiers are now on the island as part of task force that will carry out the arrest after a court released the warrants against 130 suspects. The military has given investigators until tomorrow to look into the beheading of the soldiers in Al-Barka town. The Moro Islamic Liberation Front, which is negotiating peace with Manila, admitted attacking the soldiers, but denied beheading them. It also rejected a military demand to turn over those behind the attack. Marine Col. Ramiro Alivio, commander of military forces in Basilan, said intelligence operations and security patrols were continuing but that there have been no large-scale movement of forces by either side and no armed contact have been recorded as of yesterday. The news of impending punitive actions against the MILF has triggered an exodus of civilians with more than 5,000 people fleeing their homes in Al-Barka town and nearby areas. The offensive against the MILF was delayed until Tuesday following a warning by Japan and Canada that they would halt their aid programs in the south if the fighting escalated. TV Crew The Department of Justice (DOJ), meanwhile, said it will ask the GMA-7 television crew that took footage of the July 10 clash to testify against those behind the ambush. Regional State Prosecutor Ricardo Cabaron said the DOJ would appreciate the help of GMA7 reporter Jun Veneracion and cameramen Donato Roxas and Julius Catibog, who were with the Marine soldiers when ambushed by MILF forces. Cabaron said their personal accounts and possibly the video footage taken during the ambush would give them a clear idea of how the clash happened. If we cannot get them through the voluntary process, then we will ask the court to issue the orders for the compulsory process, Cabaron said. A source who had access to the closed-door meeting of the joint government and MILF coordinating committee on the cessation of hostilities (CCCH) told the Philippine Daily Inquirer that Veneracion and his team would be asked to testify to shed light in the incident. The JCCCH is investigating the beheading of the soldiers.Veneracion earlier told the Inquirer that he would be willing to supply information to authorities if the case against the suspects prospers. Trademark Top military officials have admitted that beheading of captives has become the trademark of bandits in Basilan. There were reports that the beheadings were done by Abu Sayyaf members who have camps near the ambush site. Lt. Gen. Eugenio Cedo, the Western Mindanao Command chief, said the beheading and mutilation were called pintakasi. Once you fall or land in the hands of the attackers or enemies, pagtututulungan ka nila (they will gang up on you) doing all unimaginable acts even if you are already dead, Cedo said. AFP Chief of Staff Hermogenes Esperon Jr., in a press conference on Friday afternoon, told reporters that beheading was not a new thing in Basilan. We know about the beheadings even way back in 1970s, he said. Esperon said that when he was assigned in Basilan as a young lieutenant, there was no Abu Sayyaf group then, but beheading was one of the practices of people in the area. Dr. Nilo Barandino, a physician based in Basilan who conducts post-mortem examination, told the Inquirer that there were about 70 soldiers and innocent civilians beheaded in the 1980s. Majority of those beheaded were soldiers, Barandino said. Col. Daniel Lucero, a member of Esperons staff, recalled that when he was still with the 5th Infantry Battalion, seven soldiers were beheaded and mutilated in barangay Duga-a in Tuburan town on Feb. 14, 1984. In July 2001, two soldiers were beheaded in barangay Sinulatan in Tuburan, Lucero added. Lt. Col. Rudy de Bellen of the Philippine Marines recalled that 21 members of the 1st Marine Battalion suffered mutilation, four of them beheaded, in barangay Candis, Tuburan town on Feb. 9, 2003. The Marine soldiers came from a feast, and they were poisoned before they were attacked, De Bellen said. He said the suspects in the attack were led by Dorie Kalahal, a commander of the Moro National Liberation Front. Kalahal is now mayor of Tuburan proper. He availed himself of the governments amnesty offer. Barandino, who was able to see some of those beheaded and mutilated soldiers in the July 10 ambush, said the mutilation happened between 6:30 p.m. and 7 p.m., not midnight as earlier reported by Basilan Gov. Jum Jainuddin Akbar. Akbar earlier told the Inquirer that when they started retrieving the bodies around 10 p.m. of July 10, the bodies were still intact. Akbar said she was informed by her staff that some of the dead were beheaded during the second retrieval at around midnight. |
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Southeast Asia | |
Another Imam Murdered, Body Mutilated Amid Tension Over Beheadings in S. Philippines | |
2007-07-19 | |
![]() Marine Col. Ramiro Alivio, the islands military chief, said
He claimed that the victim had provided information to the military about the Al-Qaeda-linked Abu Sayyaf group and lawless elements in Basilan. Villagers, including the tabliq, are helping us and providing intelligence about terrorists and lawless groups in Basilan, he said without further elaborating. Last week, Abu Sayyaf militants also killed a Muslim preacher in Basilans Al-Barka town on suspicion he was passing information to military authorities about kidnapped Italian Catholic priest Giancarlo Bossi. Local officials said the imams death in the village of Ginanta in Al-Barka on July 10 happened a few hours before gunmen attacked a convoy of Marines who came to check reports that the priest was being hidden somewhere in the town. The Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), the largest Muslim group which is seeking an independent Islamic state in the southern Philippines, claimed its fighters were behind the attack but denied beheading the fallen soldiers. MILF leaders also suggested that the soldiers were behind the killing of the Ginanta preacher, an accusation strongly denied by the military. We are not savages, said Alivio yesterday. The beheadings have sparked an outrage and the military yesterday said the search for Bossi was no longer its priority. Armed Forces of the Philippines chief of staff Gen. Hermogenes Esperon reiterated the militarys demand on the MILF to surrender those responsible attack, which he said was a violation of a truce between the government and the separatist group. Esperon, who was in this southern city yesterday, said troops will pursue the culprits if the MILF fails to yield those behind the beheading. This is not a time for revenge, but a time to punish those responsible in the barbaric act, he said.We have asked them to cooperate and turn over those who were behind the dastardly act of beheading our marines. The rebels cautioned the military against taking any sweeping action on Basilan, saying it could jeopardize ongoing efforts to resume peace talks. Were reasonable people and were easy to deal with, said Mohaqher Iqbal, the rebel chief peace negotiator, told reporters by telephone from his hideout on Mindanao Island. Lets wait for the fact-finding team to finish their jobs. We understand they lost some of their comrades, but the massing of forces on Basilan will not help the peace process. Sattar Alih, head of the MILF cease-fire monitoring team in Basilan, said rebel forces withdrew from the battle scene, leaving the bodies of soldiers behind, after military and rebels agreed to a cease-fire. Intelligence sources in Basilan have implicated unnamed politicians who allegedly supplied the Abu Sayyaf with mortar rockets, weapons and munitions during the fighting. Their private armies also reportedly fought side-by-side with the MILF and that two gunmen had died in the skirmishes. The military is now investigating the reports. A tense cease-fire between the government and the MILF is holding in the south as the two sides allowed a team of Malaysian monitors to investigate the July 10 clash in which at least 18 people, including 14 marines, were killed and 16 wounded. The cease-fire between the military and the MILF, which has been in place since 2003, has been occasionally broken, but last weeks fighting was one of the most serious violations. | |
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