RP launches airstrikes on militant groups
RP launches airstrikes on militant groups
Philippine helicopter gunships and planes on Thursday attacked a suspected meeting between leaders of the al-Qaeda affiliated Abu Sayyaf and Jamaah Islamiyah (JI) militant groups, the military said.
Among those suspected of being in the area attacked in the southern Philippines were the senior leaders of the Abu Sayyaf and a certain Dulmatin, an Indonesian alleged to have been behind the deadly Bali bombings in 2002.
The strikes were based on intelligence reports that the Abu Sayyaf was meeting with Indonesian members of the JI network along with renegade members of the Muslim separatist Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) who had broken a cease-fire with the government to attack an army outpost.
Among the Abu Sayyaf leaders reportedly in the area were its chief Khadaffy Janjalani and senior members Abu Soliman and Isnilon Hapilon said Lt. Gen. Alberto Braganza, military chief of the southern island of Mindanao.
Regional military spokesman Col. Franklin Del Prado said the targets were in a group of houses scattered in a forested, marshy area on the outskirts of Datu Piang and Saudi Ampatuan towns.
Braganza said that among the JI members reported to be in the area was Dulmatin, "who figured in the Bali bombing."
Del Prado said Dulmatin was accompanied by two other Indonesians identified as Maruan and Mauyha, supposedly members of JI regional Islamic militant network.
However the officials would not say how Dulmatin entered the Philippines or what he and the others were doing in the country.
The Abu Sayyaf and JI members were meeting members of an MILF faction that overran a military outpost in the southern town of Mamasapano on Jan. 10, leaving about 21 soldiers and rebels dead, Braganza said.
The two MILF commanders Abdul Rahman Binago and Abdul Wahid Tundok led their men in attacking the army outpost without the sanction of the front's leadership but the rebels have refused to turn the two commanders over.
Braganza said MG 520 helicopter gunships and OV-10 attack planes, backed by artillery, were used because ground forces had difficulty entering the marshy area.
Some of the helicopters were hit by rebel machinegun fire but returned to base safely, a military report said.
Troops were assessing the effect of the strikes, del Prado said.
Janjalani heads the Abu Sayyaf, a Moro extremist group known mainly for kidnapping and bombing attacks against Christians and foreigners in the Philippines for over a decade.
It has been linked by both Washington and Manila to the al- Qaeda network of Osama bin Laden. --AFP