Extort Group Owns Up Bombing In Mindanao

A security guard of the Philbest Canning Corporation in General Santos City in southern Philippines stands Saturday, February 2, 2008 near the site where a bomb had exploded last week killing four people. (Mindanao Examiner Photo/Gandhi C. Kinjiyo)

GENERAL SANTOS CITY, Philippines (Mindanao Examiner / Feb. 02, 2008) – A shadowy group calling itself the Al-Khobar gang has allegedly owned to a recent bombing in the southern Philippines, reports said.

Reports said the gang, composed mostly of former Moro Islamic Liberation Front rebels and criminals, claimed the January 30 bombing outside the Philbest Canning Corporation in the village of Tambler that killed four people and wounded at least 28 others.

An explosive was left on a parked motorcycle outside the factory where it detonated as employees were coming out of the Philbest compound. Police initially blamed labor disputes at the factory and failed extortion as the motive of the attack.

Police and military also linked the group to previous bombings in strife-torn region the past years. Al-Khobar was behind many extortion activities in Mindanao. (Gandhi C. Kinjiyo)