DATU SAUDI AMPATUAN, Maguindanao — Eight members of the Daesh-linked Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF) were killed as government forces launched Thursday air and ground assaults against the group here.
The air strikes by two Augusta Westland helicopters and artillery bombardment on Thursday also sent more than a hundred families fleeing from the villages of Kitango and Salbu, this municipality.
Maj. Gen. Arnel Dela Vega, Army’s 6th Infantry Division and Joint Task Force Central commander, on Friday said six BIFF bandits were killed by air strikes and ground assaults that started at 5 a.m. Thursday and lasted until after lunch time.
But residents and village watchmen reported to the ground troops that eight BIFF rebels were confirmed killed.
The target of the air strikes and artillery bombardment from 105-mm howitzers and 81-mm mortars was the Karialan faction of the BIFF led by a certain Commander Peni.
Lt. Col. Gerry Besana, 6th Infantry Division Civil-Military Operations chief, said a certain Faisal Solaiman of the BIFF was injured.
Bai Kanakan Absal said the loud explosion and gun fires awakened the residents in Barangay Salbu and someone yelled “bakwit tayo, mayron engkwentro ang Army at Freedom fighters (Let’s evacuate, the Army and BIFF are fighting again).”
Moro families hurriedly fled their homes carrying valuables and other personal belongings moving in opposite direction to the military hardware and ground troops along the Crossing Salbu-Lower Salbu highway.
Absal’s husband was left behind to take care of the family’s farm animals and other valuables.
The scene along the highway was similar to the sights and sounds during the early hours of the Marawi siege in May last year.
The movement of military hardware and ground troops out to reinforce the engaged forces were briefly halted along the highway as a suspected roadside bomb was reported to them by the residents.
A certain Private First Class Molato was slightly injured in his right arm though the bomb was deactivated.
While the fighting rages, another faction of suspected BIFF rebels attacked a military outpost in Barangay Labu-Labu in nearby Shariff Aguak town, this province and an Army based in Barangay Nabalawag, Midsayap, North Cotabato.
There was no casualty in the attack that took place at around 2 p.m. Thursday at the detachment in Barangay Labu-Labu.
Two soldiers identified as a certain TSgt. Aquino and Cpl. Deligero of the Army’s 34th Infantry Battalion were injured when two men riding tandem on a motorcycle fired rifle grenade around 4 p.m., also Thursday, at the detachment in Nabalawag, Midsayap.
“It was diversionary tactics of the BIFF,” an Army intelligence official disclosed. (PNA)
