DAVAO CITY, Philippines (Mindanao Examiner / Jan. 3, 2008) – Communist rebels postponed the release of Special Forces commander being held as prisoner of war after government troops launched fresh offensive in Mindanao.
Rigoberto Sanchez, a spokesman for the New People’s Army, blamed the military offensive for the failed release of First Lieutenant Vicente Cammayo.
Cammayo was captured Nov. 7 after rebel forces attacked his unit and killed two soldiers and a government militia in a fierce firefight in Casoon village in the town of Monkayo in Compostela Valley province.
“The volatile ground situation due to the ongoing AFP troop deployment and current offensive military operations has made the safe and orderly release of POW 1Lt. Vicente P. Cammayo not feasible,” he said.
He said troops, from the Army’s 10th Infantry Division, resumed offensive operations since Thursday in Compostela Valley.
“Due to this ground situation, the scheduled release of POW Cammayo on the first week of January is hereby affected. POW Cammayo's release will be reset until such time that all offensive military operations are ceased,” Sanchez said.
The NPA last week said it would free Cammayo as a gesture of goodwill. It ordered the release of the prisoner on Dec. 28. “The continuing AFP offensive operation is a big impediment to the safe and orderly procedure of POW Cammayo's release and eventual reunion with his family,” he said.
The rebels last month freed a captured policeman Eduardo Tumol, who was also seized Nov. 5 at a checkpoint in the village of Baogo in Davao Oriental's Caraga town.
Sanchez earlier said that the NPA could suspend the release of Cammayo, commander of the 11th Company of the Army's 3rd Special Forces, if military forces continue its operations that would endanger the safety of the prisoner.
"The implementation of the order of release shall be based on the NPA custodial unit's assessment of the ground situation particularly the movement of AFP troops. The NPA custodial unit has the authority to suspend the release of POW Cammayo if enemy movement continues since the safety of the said prisoner of war and the receiving party is of utmost importance," he said.
Sanchez previously said that both Tumol and Cammayo were investigated for possible human rights violations and other crimes related to the operations of the Special Forces and the Provincial Mobile Group in Mindanao.
Aris Francisco, spokesman of the NPA's Alejandro Lanaja Command, accused the 3rd Special Forces Battalion to which Cammayo's unit belongs, as responsible for the series of violations to human rights, protocols of war and international humanitarian law in Compostela Valley province.
The NPA, armed wing of the outlawed Communist Party of the Philippines, is fighting the government the past four decades for the establishment of a Maoist state in the country. Peace talks between Manila and the CPP-NPA collapsed in 2004 after both sides failed to sign an agreement ending hostilities in the countryside. (Mindanao Examiner)
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