ZAMBOANGA CITY, 14 April 2995 - The Philippine Army yesterday troops have captured a key rebel fort of the New People's Army (NPA) and seized a cache of weapons and explosive from an underground tunnel in the southern province of Agusan del Norte.
The jungle base of the rebel's North-Central Mindanao Regional Committee in the town of Nasipit in northeastern Mindanao, was seized after a firefight on Monday, a spokesman for the army's 4th Infantry Division said.
"The troops surprised the communist fighters who abandoned the camp after a firefight, leaving behind several equipment and other war materiel," Maj. Alexis Bravo told Arab News.
The cache was recovered from a complex tunnel system dug and patterned by rebels to underground camps during the Vietnam War. "The captured camp is the first of its kind as it is copied from the model of the Viet Cong underground camps during the Vietnam War. It has tunnels that can accommodate 60 to 100 occupants complete with toilets and bathrooms, kithens and communication rooms," Bravo said.
The military had earlier said the rebels were plotting to bomb civilian and government targets in the southern Philippines as part of a campaign to destabilize the Arroyo government and blame the attacks to the extremist Abu Sayyaf group and the Southeast Asia terror network Jemaah Islamiyah.
Maj. Gen. Samuel Bagasin, the regional military commander for northeast Mindanao, said among those recovered from the rebel base were dynamite sticks, rolls of detonating cords, blasting caps and ignition switches used in the manufacture of bombs, bomb-making manuals detailing the use of remote detonation and cell phone to trigger explosion, chemical fertilizers and acid solution, and assorted high-power rifles and hundreds of ammunition.
Soldiers also found communications equipment, anti-government propaganda materials in compact discs and cassette tapes, and dozens of "subversive" documents and communist publications.
Bagasin said soldiers were pursuing rebels in the province. But while government offensive continues, the military is also trying to lure the rebels to take advantage of the amnesty program.
"The rebels are living like rats and snakes while their self-exiled leader Jose Maria Sison and his group are living like kings in the Netherlands. I am again calling the red fighters to come down from the mountains and live normal lives with their families. You are all welcome to come back to our communities and avail of the government's amnesty program," Bagasin said.
The NPA, armed wing of the outlawed Communist Party of the Philippines, has been waging war in the last 30 years with the aim of toppling the government and install a Maoist state. Rebel spokesman Gregorio Rosal has renewed calls for an armed struggle against the government. He also urged insurgents to continue their attacks against military targets across the country.
The United States and the European Union blacklisted the CPP-NDF and the NPA on Manila's recommendation and have included them in the foreign terrorist lists and froze its assets abroad.
