RP Military Accused MILF Rebels Of Murdering Soldier, 2 Others In Mindanao

COTABATO CITY (Mindanao Examiner /02 Feb) – The Philippine military accused Friday the country’s largest Muslim rebel group, Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), of murdering three people, including a soldier kidnapped in the southern Philippines.

The three had been killed in separately near Midsayap town in North Cotabato province, where rebels are actively operating, said Colonel Julieto Ando, spokesman for the Army’s 6th Infantry Division.

“We have filed criminal complaints to the courts about these murders perpetrated by MILF rebels. The murders were also a violation of the cease-fire agreement and we also filed a protest to the government panel negotiating peace with the MILF,” Ando told the Midnanao Examiner.

The MILF is currently negotiating peace with the Arroyo government, but despite a truce signed in 2001, sporadic clashes still continue in many areas in the troubled region.

Ando said guerrillas seized an army sergeant, Isidro Elas and his unidentified companion on Wednesday while returning home on a motorcycle from. He said the bodies of the two had been recovered by soldiers and brought Friday to the army base.

He said rebels also kidnapped a Muslim farmer, Ontong Abdullah, last week in Midsayap town and had been shot dead. “His body was thrown in the river. Abdullah was a civilian; he was a farmer and killed by rebels on suspicion that Abdullah was a military spy,” Ando said.

Eid Kabalu, a spokesman for the MILF, said his group was investigating whether rebels were behind the killing of the soldier and his companion. “We are investigating the report, whether MILF rebels were involved in the soldier’s killing. We can’t say anything at this time,” he said in a separate interview.

But Kabalu admitted that Abdullah, who was seized by rebels to stand trial for an alleged crime, was accidentally killed after he tried to grab the M16 automatic rifle of one of his captor. An MILF guard, who saw the commotion, hit Abdulah on the head with a rifle and the man never regained consciousness, he said.

Kabalu did not say what crime Abdullah committed. But the MILF is known to arrest criminals and put them on trial in their own so-called rebel court, and the group had publicly executed several prisoners who were founded guilty, in the past. (Mindanao Examiner)