Bombs in RP mall kill six, Jamaah suspected

Bombs in RP mall kill six, Jamaah suspected

Reuters, Zamboanga, Philippines

Bombs ripped through the main shopping district of a mostly
Christian city in an area of the southern Philippines at the
heart of Moro insurgency on Thursday, killing six and wounding
about 150.

It was the second major bomb attack in Southeast Asia in less
than a week and suspicion immediately focused on a radical
religious group also being investigated for Saturday's explosions
on the Indonesian island of Bali, in which more than 180 people
died.

Shouts of "There's a bomb", "Another explosion", "Run...Run"
rent the air in the city of Zamboanga as terrified shoppers and
shopkeepers ran on to narrow streets littered with wreckage,
glass and mutilated bodies from the twin midday blasts.

Troops found and defused at least two other bombs.

The military blamed radicals fighting for an Islamic state in
the south of the Roman Catholic nation and said investigators
were looking into the possible involvement of the militant Jamaah
Islamiah group.

"All threat groups are suspect in this incident, including the
Jamaah Islamiah...and others," armed forces deputy spokesman Lt.
Col. Danilo Servando told reporters in Manila, referring to the
Indonesia-based group linked by some to Osama bin Laden's al-
Qaeda network.

The twin explosions in Zamboanga came amid a heightened
security alert across the country after the Bali bombings, in
which carnage Jamaah Islamiah is also suspected.

Police said they were questioning 16 people, including two
Turkish nationals and a Malaysian, over the Zamboanga explosions.

Zamboanga Mayor Maria Clara Lobregat said six people were
killed and that at least 20 of the 143 injured were in critical
condition. The dead included at least three women and a child.
One man's head was blown off.

Zamboanga has been the scene in recent years of bombings
blamed on the Abu Sayyaf guerrillas, whom the United States has
linked to al-Qaeda, prime suspect in last year's Sept. 11 attacks
on the United States.

Some 260 U.S. troops are in Zamboanga, the remnants of a
1,000-strong force which spent six months in the area this year
to train Filipino soldiers in eliminating the Abu Sayyaf. Police
said no foreigners were hurt in the blasts.

The first bomb, which exploded around noon (11 a.m. in
Jakarta) in the Shop-o-Rama mall, wrecked cars, flung motorcycles
down the street and tore open shuttered shops. One man was thrown
through a plate glass window. Police were seen later dragging
away bodies, some horribly disfigured.

Police cordoned off the streets around the shopping complex
where bunting hung incongruously under the baking sun. One corner
shop advertized European bread for sale.

Heavily armed troops then ringed the area as investigators
brought in sniffer dogs to check for further explosives.

Investigators said the first blast occurred in or near the
vegetable section of the crowded Shop-o-Rama, one of the most
popular malls in Zamboanga. Thirty minutes later, an explosion
rocked a store nearby.

"The bombings are apparently coordinated," newly installed
southern military command chief Lt. Gen. Narciso Abaya told
reporters. "They are targeting crowded places where there are
plenty of civilians."

The blasts occurred about two weeks after a homemade bomb
exploded near a karaoke bar in the city, killing a U.S. soldier
and two Filipino civilians. Police blamed that explosion, on Oct.
2, on the Abu Sayyaf.

Zamboanga, a city of 700,000 people 860 km (535 miles) south
of Manila, lies on the southern coast of the politically volatile
Mindanao island, where Muslims have been fighting for a separate
homeland for over three decades.