Two militiamen killed, another hurt in southern Philippine bombing
Bombing in southern province where Abu Sayyaf terror group still active.
BASILAN: Two militiamen were killed while another was badly injured in a roadside bombing in the southern Philippine of Basilan on Monday (Nov. 27).
Brig. Gen. Alvin Luzon, commander of the Philippine Army’s 101st Infantry Brigade, and the Basilan Provincial Police Office separately confirmed that the human casualties came from the Citizens Auxiliary Army, a state paramilitary group, killed in the incident in Limbo Candiis village, Sumisip town, PhilStar reported.
The victims, along with personnel of the Army’s 64th Infantry Battalion, had been out to verify the reported presence of armed men in an interior area in Candiis when the homemade bomb, packed with fragments of cast iron with jagged edges and planted along their route, went off.
The improvised explosive device was detonated from a distance using a mobile phone, according to Army and police officials in the island province.Â
Local officials told reporters that the bombing was perpetrated by local terrorists aiming to create an impression that the surrender to Basilan police and the 101st Infantry Brigade of more than 400 members of the Abu Sayyaf in the past six years had not weakened their capability to launch terror attacks.
Almost all of the terrorists who had surrendered during the period through the intercession of local executives led by Gov. Hadjiman Salliman had been reintegrated into mainstream society, PhilStar reported further.
Basilan is the operating area of the Abu Sayyaf terror group where still-at-large subleader Mudzrimar Sawadjaan @ Mundi, an expert bombmaker wanted by both the Philippines and Malaysia, was last reportedly seen.
The Abu Sayyaf was tagged in the several recent suicide bombings in Sulu province and maritime kidnappings in eastern Sabah, Malaysia.