ZAMBOANGA CITY, 28 January 2007 — At least four people have been killed in clashes between government forces and Muslim separatist fighters in the Philippines’ main southern island of Mindanao, military and rebel officials said yesterday.

Security forces backed by combat helicopters assaulted positions held by Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) rebels suspected of attacking farmers and army-led militias in North Cotabato province.

Mohagher Iqbal, the MILF’s chief peace negotiator, said one rebel was killed and another wounded in the attacks, which started on Friday on a village in North Cotabato’s Midsayap town. “The bombings killed one rebel and wounded another fighter. This is blatant violation of the cease-fire. We are protesting the military attacks,” he told Arab News.

Iqbal said at least five villages have been bombed by military forces. He said the fighting erupted after armed militias and Christian landowners tried to drive away local Muslim villagers, some of them members of the MILF.

He said the soldiers sided with the militias and attacked rebel forces, sparking sporadic, but fierce clashes since Thursday.

“Fighting is still raging in Midsayap,” Iqbal told Reuters by telephone from a hideout in Mindanao. “We’re still trying to confirm if our troops suffered some casualties because OV-10 planes were also indiscriminately dropping bombs in several villages in Midsayap.”

Col. Julieto Ando, a spokesman for the army’s 6th Infantry Division, said rebels started the fighting when they attacked farmers and militias.

“It was the rebels who started this fight. They attacked people who were just harvesting coconuts. The MILF violated the truce and we will file a protest with the government peace panel,” Ando said in a separate interview.

Ando said a pro-government militiaman was killed on Thursday, three rebels were killed on Friday and two soldiers wounded in the fighting yesterday.

Iqbal and Ando agreed on two points: that hundreds of people from two villages have fled their homes as a result of the fighting, and that the fighting must stop so as not to jeopardize the peace process.

“Many people have fled their homes and we are trying to protect the villages from the rebels,” Ando said. (With reports from Agencies)