ZAMBOANGA CITY, 3 January 2003 —- Troops raided a New People’s Army (NPA) rebel hideout and arrested three senior members in the southern Philippines, the military said yesterday.
The suspected rebels were identified as Eusebio Dumaguit, also known as Ka Iraq, and Ely Castro and Carlos Tulib, both members of the “Semi-Legal Team” of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP).
A military report said soldiers, acting on a tip-off by civilian “assets,” cornered the trio in the village of Bad-as in Placer town of Surigao del Norte.
Dumaguit is the CPP head for northern Mindanao and is facing a string of criminal charges from murder to kidnappings, said Col. Fredesvindo Covarrubias of the military’s Civil Relations Group.
“The long arm of the law will surely catch up with them and the civilians are fed up with their ruthless activities,” Covarrubias told reporters in a news conference yesterday.
The arrest of the trio coincided as both the military and the rebels were observing a truce. But the the Southern Command said the truce does not prevent security forces from arresting wanted persons. “The provisions of the existing Suspension of Military Operations between the government and the CPP-NPA do not cover the arrest of the trio,” a Southern Command statement said yesterday.
The trio are currently undergoing investigation in an undisclosed military base in the province, it said.
The military also accused the NPA of violating its own truce after rebels killed a government soldier and wounded his two sons in attack late Wednesday in the central Philippine province of Samar.
At least six gunmen shot Cpl. Alfredo Monacho at his house in the village of Tominamos near Sta. Rita town shortly before 8 p.m. on Wednesday. His two sons were injured, said Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) spokesman Lt. Col. Daniel Lucero.
Monacho belonged to the army’s 52nd Infantry Battalion, whose unit was pursuing the NPA in the province. The gunmen fled after the killing and neighbors rushed the wounded children - whose identities and ages were not released by the military - to hospital.
Lucero said one of the two children is in serious condition. “The children ran to their father to cover him, but the terrorists kept on firing their guns and hit them,” he said.
