At least 19 dead in Davao bomb blasts
At least 19 dead in Davao bomb blasts
Agencies, Davao, Philippines
At least 19 people were killed and more than 100 others injured
on Tuesday in a bomb attack at a key airport in the rebellion-
torn southern Philippines, officials and reports said.
The blast struck a shed outside the Davao airport terminal
amid the backdrop of increased Muslim guerrilla activity in the
region ahead of a planned deployment of U.S. anti-terror troops.
Another bomb exploded at a bus depot in Davao city but no one
was injured while three others were wounded in a blast at a city
health office in the nearby city of Taguma shortly after the
airport attack.
The authorities shut down Davao airport as a precaution.
The relatively peaceful Davao has 1.2 million people and is
the largest city of the southern Philippines.
"It's a very powerful bomb. The waiting shed literally
exploded," Davao Vice Mayor Luis Bongoyan said of the airport
blast.
"We have suspects and we are running after them," Mindanao
police chief Edgardo Aglipay said without elaborating. Aglipay
told GMA television the bomb had been planted in an abandoned
rucksack.
Government-run Davao Medical Center listed 19 dead from the
airport blast and more than 50 injured, including at least nine
Filipinos.
Casualties at other hospitals raised the number of injured to
114, including three Americans.
The U.S. embassy in Manila said on Tuesday one American had
died after being severely wounded by a powerful bomb blast at an
airport in Davao.
"One of the Americans has died," a spokesman for the embassy
told Reuters. But he did not know the exact condition of the
three injured Americans.
Radio station DXDC placed the death toll at 30, without giving
a source for the figure, which officials could not immediately
confirm.
The powerful blast at about 5:15 p.m. (4:15 p.m. Jakarta time)
obliterated a shed used by passengers and well-wishers outside
the airport's passenger terminal, he said over ABS-CBN
television.
Flag-carrier Philippine Airlines (PAL) suspended flights to
Davao until further notice. The last of three PAL flights to
Davao for the day was recalled back to Manila about 35 minutes
before touchdown, an airline statement said.
President Gloria Arroyo "strongly condemns the Davao bombing
as a brazen act of terrorism, which will not go unpunished,"
presidential spokesman Ignacio Bunye said in a statement.
Arroyo was holding an emergency meeting of the cabinet
oversight committee on internal security to discuss the
government response, he added.
Separatist Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) rebels
condemned the Davao bombing and denied responsibility.
Meanwhile in Zamboanga, the Philippine army said on Tuesday it
had killed 14 Muslim separatist rebels in fresh fighting on
southern Mindanao island, including 10 hit by air force bombs.
In another development, large areas of the southern Philippine
island of Mindanao were blacked out for the second time in a week
on Tuesday amid suspected sabotage by rebels from the country's
biggest Muslim separatist group.
An estimated 2.4 million Filipinos in the major cities of
Davao, Cagayan de Oro, General Santos, Butuan and Cobatao were
without electricity after a 138-kilovolt line tripped at about
10:45 a.m. (9:45 a.m. Jakarta time), according to the National
Transmission Co. (Transco)