18 die in rebel clashes, says Philippine Army

MANILA: Breakaway rebel group attacked army troops in two towns in the southern Philippines, sparking clashes that left 17 guerrillas and a soldier dead in a region where the government and the main rebel group were to enforce a new peace deal.
Regional military spokesman Col. Dickson Hermoso said BIFM fighters assaulted the soldiers in two adjacent towns in Maguindanao province Monday, prompting government forces to retaliate in fighting that also wounded three soldiers.
Hermoso said troops identified five of the rebel casualties but did not immediately provide other details.
The rebels broke off from the MILF, the main rebel group which signed a new autonomy deal in the south with the Philippine government in March. The breakaway rebels opposed the peace talks, preferring to take up arms for a separate homeland in the south of the nation.
The breakaway rebels have launched attacks in the past in what the government said were futile attempts to sabotage Malaysian-brokered negotiations that led to the signing in March of a new deal to establish a more powerful and potentially larger autonomous region in the south of the country.
Both sides are finalizing draft legislation, which they hope Congress will approve that will allow them to set up the new autonomous region to try to wean poverty-wracked areas from decades of unrest and violence.
“One of our soldiers was killed during the (initial) attack. The 17 enemies were killed when our troops fired back and during the subsequent encounters,” Brig. Gen. Eduardo Pangilinan, the area’s military commander, told reporters.
There was a lull in fighting on Tuesday but the military remained on alert, with helicopter gunships flying overhead and armored vehicles parked on the streets of Cotabato City, a trading center in the area.
“There have been no additional encounters but we are continuing our operations on the ground,” Pangilinan added.
Fighting began in the early hours of Monday morning as BIFF guerrillas attacked military outposts in the violence-scarred province of Maguindanao.
The violence later spread to the neighboring province of North Cotabato before the rebels pulled back, Pangilinan said.
BIFF spokesman Abu Misry Mama disputed the military’s version of events, saying only four of his fighters had been killed.