ZAMBOANGA CITY, 14 March 2004 — Government forces had stumbled on a jungle camp of the separatist Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) in the mountains of Zamboanga del Norte province on Mindanao Island, the military said yesterday.

MILF rebels had apparently abandoned the camp in the town of Sirawai even before security forces could arrive, said Lt. Col. Renoir Pascua, the Southern Command’s information chief.

He said the encampment, about a kilometer wide, could accommodate some 300 persons and had a network of bunkers and trenches and a small area in what troops described probably as a graveyard.

Pascua accused the MILF of violating a cease-fire agreement when it illegally constructed the encampment. “The construction of the rebel camp is a violation by the MILF of the cease-fire agreement it signed with the government (last year),” he told Arab News.

The MILF admitted establishing the Camp Salman Al-Farise in Sirawai’s mountain complex called Sipakit, which the military claimed is being used as a springboard for terror attacks in Mindanao.

It was not immediately known if the abandoned rebel camp was part of the MILF’s Camp Salman Al-Farise, one of 46 camps of the MILF in Mindanao.

Fierce fighting erupted Wednesday between government soldiers and MILF forces in Sipakit, leaving a rebel dead and two others wounded on both sides.

The Southern Command said about 200 gunmen attacked patrolling government forces and triggering a firefight that lasted more than six hours.

The fighting erupted ahead of the expected arrival of a small group of Malaysian truce observers next week.

MILF spokesman Eid Kabalu said, however, that government troops attacked their camp without any provocation, apparently to sabotage the peace process.

Kabalu claimed the assault was nevertheless repelled despite the use of attack helicopters.

Pascua denied the accusation yesterday and insisted that rebel violated the truce.

The rebels have been fighting for more than three decades for the establishment of a strict Islamic state in the south. Malaysia is brokering negotiations in hopes of forging a political settlement of the conflict.