Arroyo visits wounded troops; condoles with families of slain soldiers in Mindanao

Philippine President Gloria Arroyo condoles Saturday, August 15, 2009 with the family of one of 23 soldiers slain in fierce clashes with the al-Qaeda-linked Abu Sayyaf militants and Moro rebels in Basilan province. Arroyo also held a closed door command conference with senior military and defense officials at the tightly guarded Western Mindanao Command in Zamboanga City. Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro, who was with Arroyo, said the President has ordered the military to wipe out the Abu Sayyaf, blamed for the spate of terrorism and kidnappings in the southern Philippines. (Mindanao Examiner Photo)

ZAMBOANGA CITY, Philippines (Mindanao Examiner / August 15, 2009) –President Gloria Arroyo arrived in Zamboanga City on Saturday and condoled with the families of soldiers killed in fierce clashes with Abu Sayyaf militants and Moro rebels in the southern province of Basilan.

Arroyo, accompanied by Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro and Armed Forces chief General Victor Ibrado, also visited wounded soldiers at a military hospital at the Western Mindanao Command headquarters where she handed cash assistance

She spoke with the families of the slain soldiers and awarded posthumous medals and money worth more than seven million pesos. Arroyo later presided over a command conference with senior military and police commanders.

Teodoro said the President ordered the military to wipe out the Abu Sayyaf, blamed for the spate of terrorism and kidnappings-for-ransom in the southern Philippines.

“The President’s order is to wipe out the Abu Sayyaf,” the Defense Secretary told reporters.

Troops on Wednesday stormed an Abu Sayyaf camp in the village of Silangkum in Basilan’s Ungkaya Pukan town, but security forces also clashed with Moro Islamic Liberation Front rebels in the neighboring village of Baguindan.

The MILF said soldiers attacked its forces without provocation, an accusation denied by the military. The MILF is the country’s largest Muslim rebel group fighting for self-determination in the South. The fighting killed 23 soldiers and 20 militants and rebels. (Mindanao Examiner)

Fighting subsides in southern Philippines; military gives honors to 23 slain soldiers

Family members weep Friday, August 14, 2009 as they view the remains of a soldier inside a gym in Zamboanga City in the southern Philippines. The military says 23 soldiers and 20 Abu Sayyaf militants were killed in Wednesday fighting in Basilan province.

(Mindanao Examiner Photo Service)

ZAMBOANGA CITY, Philippines (Mindanao Examiner / August 14, 2009) – Fighting between troops and Moro rebels subsided in the southern Philippine province of Basilan as the military on Friday gave funeral honors to 23 soldiers killed in the clashes.

“There have been no reports of fighting in Basilan, but military operations against the Abu Sayyaf still continue,” said Marine Major General Benjamin Dolorfino, commander of military forces in Mindanao.

Troops stormed an Abu Sayyaf camp in the hinterland village of Silangkum in Ungkaya Pukan town on Wednesday and seized weapons and improvised explosives. But soldiers also clashed with a group of Moro Islamic Liberation Front rebels in the neighboring village of Baguindan that sparked daylong clashes that also killed 10 gunmen.

The MILF, which is currently negotiating peace with Manila, accused government soldiers of attacking the rebels. It said troops also mutilated the bodies of three of rebels, including a senior MILF leader, killed in the clashes.

Dolorfino denied the MILF accusations. “That’s not true,” he told the Mindanao Examiner.

On Friday, Dolorfino led funeral honors for the slain soldiers in Zamboanga City along with Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro and Armed Forces chief General Victor Ibrado.

Relatives and families of killed soldiers weep as fellow soldiers pay their last respect to the fallen marines and infantrymen. Coffins of soldiers were paraded inside the Western Mindanao Command headquarters where hundreds of soldiers and civilian employees lined up a road leading to the gymnasium where the caskets are put on display for public viewing.

“What did they do to our boy? He’s such a young soldier. He doesn’t deserve this brutality,” cried one woman.

And just across the woman, family members also gathered and weeping around a coffin of a soldier, whose face was deformed because of what looked like a hack wound. Two other caskets were closed to hide the wounds in the faces of the slain soldiers, both marines.

Lieutenant Colonel Gamal Hayudini, commander of the military’s 4th Civil Relations Group, said MILF gunmen engaged government troops, who were pursuing the Abu Sayyaf, in a firefight despite an earlier coordination between the military and the rebel group.

“The government forces were confident with the on-going peace negotiation, thus, making the troops believe that nothing will really happen since the MILF was informed of the pursuit operations but unexpectedly, they engaged in firefight with our forces. The MILF should not mislead the people by always passing on the blame to the government forces,” he said.

The MILF is the country’s largest Muslim rebel group which is fighting the past three decades for self-determination.

President Gloria Arroyo opened up peace talks with the MILF in 2001 in an effort to put an end to the bloody fighting in Mindanao. (Mindanao Examiner)

Philippine Army hunt vs. MILF rebels continue

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Philippine military chief visits wounded troops in Zamboanga City

Philippine military chief General Victor Ibrado visited Monday, June 15, 2009 in Zamboanga City the 17 soldiers wounded in fierce clashes with Abu Sayyaf militants in Sulu province. He also viewed the remains of 7 others killed in the clash. (Mindanao Examiner Photo / Jung Francisco)

ZAMBOANGA CITY, Philippines (Mindanao Examiner / June 15, 2009) - Philippine military chief General Victor Ibrado visited Monday in Zamboanga City government troops wounded in fierce clashes with Abu Sayyaf militants in the southern Sulu province.

He also viewed the remains of seven more soldiers killed in the fighting last week in Sulu's Indanan town. Ibrado said security forces were pursuing Abu Sayyaf militants blamed for the spate of kidnappings and terrorism in the troubled south.

The fighting, which began on Friday, also left at least 8 militants killed, according to the military.
The Abu Sayyaf is still holding an Italian Red Cross worker, Eugenio Vagni, who was kidnapped January 15 along with Swiss national Andreas Notter and Filipino Mary Jean Lacaba.

Both Notter and Lacaba had been freed after a series of negotiations, but there were suspicions that ransoms had been paid to the kidnappers for the release of the two aid workers.

The Red Cross said no ransom was paid for the freedom of Notter and Lacaba. (With a report from Jung Francisco)

Army commander named next Philippine military chief

An undated photo of Philippine Army chief Lieutenant General Victor Ibrado.

MANILA, Philippines (Mindanao Examiner / Apr. 14, 2009) – President Gloria Arroyo has named Tuesday her Army commander Lieutenant General Victor Ibrado as the next Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces of the Philippines.

Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro Jr. made the announcement on Tuesday. Ibrado is to replace AFP chief General Alexander Yano when he retires on June 13.

Lieutenant General Delfin Bangit, chief of the army’s Southern Luzon Command, will take over Ibrado as new army chief. (Mindanao Examiner)

Philippine Army orders probe into media complaints against officer in Mindanao

MANILA, Philippines (Mindanao Examiner / Nov. 6, 2008) – The Philippine Army has ordered an investigation into a controversial officer accused of berating a journalist covering a fire that razed an ammo dump inside a military base in Mindanao.

Lt. Col. John Oswald Bucu, camp commander of the Army’s 6th Infantry Division in Maguindanao province, berated Loreto Rosario, of the Catholic radio station dxMS in Cotabato City, while reporting about an ammo dump which exploded October 31.

The officer also seized Rosario’s cellular phones and brought him at the camp’s public information office where Bucu continued to lambaste the journalist in front of soldiers.

Lt. Col. Julieto Ando, the army division spokesman, who knew Rosario, has already apologized to the journalist, but Bucu remains defiant despite mounting calls from media groups for the military to discipline the officer.

Other journalists covering the fire were also prevented from getting near the ammo dump even after the blaze was over. The National Union of Journalists of the Philippines has already demanded the military to discipline Bucu. His superiors have ignored these calls.

Bucu accused Rosario of intruding inside the camp and said that if not for him, soldiers could have shot the journalist, who has been covering the military the past years, reports said.

Journalists in Cotabato City have already boycotted coverage of the army division headquarters and demanded that relief of Bucu.

”The NUJP is demanding that the AFP impose strong sanctions against Bucu for his clear assault on press freedom,” the media organization said in a statement.

Maj. Gen. Raymundo Ferrer, 6th Infantry Division commander, has not responded to the NUJP demand, but journalists vowed to bring this to the attention of Defense Secy. Gilberto Teodoro and Philippine Army Chief Gen. Victor Ibrado.

Ibrado has already ordered an investigation into the NUJP complaints against Bucu, according to Lt. Col. Romeo Brawner, the Philippine Army spokesman.

“General Victor Ibrado has already ordered General (Raymundo) Ferrer to conduct an investigation on the matter,” Brawner told the Mindanao Examiner. Brawner said the embattled army officer insisted he was just protecting Rosario who was trying to get near the burning ammo dump.

Both Ferrer and Bucu are currently in Manila because of the ongoing investigations into the fire that destroyed the ammo dump.

The NUJP said Rosario’s case was not the first time that Bucu has targeted journalists. Two years ago, at a gathering of reporters at the headquarters of the Army’s 602nd Infantry Brigade in North Cotabato, Bucu allegedly branded NUJP Kidapawan chapter president Malu Manar a member of the communist rebel group New People’s Army.

Manar is also the program director of the Catholic radio station dxND in North Cotabato.

“We understand Ando has apologized for the incident, which speaks well of Ando but highlights the utter arrogance of Bucu. The only conclusion we can draw is that Bucu thinks he can get away with what he did, just as many of the brains behind the scores of unsolved media murders do. Even more disturbing, however, he is clear proof of the culture of impunity that has thrived in this country because of official inaction, even apathy, towards continued attacks on media.”

“Indeed, we would not be surprised if Bucu had taken his cue to harass Rosario or, earlier, to publicly slander Manar, from this government’s actual attempts to muzzle the independent Philippine press, as we saw in the short-lived state of emergency of February 2006 and the more recent arrest of journalists covering the Manila Peninsula incident last year. The AFP should impose on Bucu the sanctions he so richly deserves for his clear assault on press freedom. Failure to do so will only reinforce the perception that there is, at best, tacit official approval of attempts to silence the media,” an Asian Press report, quoting the NUJP, said Thursday. (Mindanao Examiner)