MANILA: Security forces in the southern Philippines have killed two terrorists of a local extremist organization sympathetic to the Daesh group, a police report said Saturday.
Police commandoes raided a hideout of the Ansar Khilafa Philippines (AKP) group in the coastal town of Maasim, killing two fighters, a police report said.
The commandoes recovered a cache of weapons including a sniper rifle, two carbines, rocket-propelled grenades, materials for making improvised explosive devices and a black flag of Daesh, which has captured large swathes of territory in the Middle East.
However the target of the raid, the group’s leader, Jaafar Maguid, escaped, the report added.
The AKP is one of several militant groups in the southern third of the largely-Catholic Philippines that have pledged allegiance to Daesh.
Authorities have said these groups have no direct link to Daesh and are merely using its name to gain prestige locally and in the hope of gaining the international terrorist group’s support and funding.
Police commandoes raided a hideout of the Ansar Khilafa Philippines (AKP) group in the coastal town of Maasim, killing two fighters, a police report said.
The commandoes recovered a cache of weapons including a sniper rifle, two carbines, rocket-propelled grenades, materials for making improvised explosive devices and a black flag of Daesh, which has captured large swathes of territory in the Middle East.
However the target of the raid, the group’s leader, Jaafar Maguid, escaped, the report added.
The AKP is one of several militant groups in the southern third of the largely-Catholic Philippines that have pledged allegiance to Daesh.
Authorities have said these groups have no direct link to Daesh and are merely using its name to gain prestige locally and in the hope of gaining the international terrorist group’s support and funding.
