2 wounded in Cotabato City blast

COTABATO CITY, Philippines—Two persons were slightly wounded when a powerful improvised explosive device went off near the house of Rosary Heights 9 village chief Lito Sisneros Thursday.

Senior Superintendent Danny Reyes, city police director, said the blast occurred at about 6:15 p.m. The village chair’s residential compound was beside a flea market situated along Gutierrez Avenue.

Reyes said the two unidentified wounded victims were vendors of the flea market.

Initial investigation showed that the IED was fashioned from two 60 millimeter mortar shells with a mobile phone as trigger mechanism.

Sisneros said no one saw who placed the explosive beside the concrete wall of his compound, which was very near to his son’s sleeping quarter.

“We have no known enemies, why are we subjected to this?” he asked. “Please spare us,” he added, referring to the perpetrators.

No one has claimed responsibility for the latest bombing.

On Wednesday, authorities foiled another attempt by unidentified men to set off an IED, when they defused a bomb planted at the back of the Cotabato City public cemetery.

Earlier, Director Felissicimu Khu, chief of Directorate for Integrated Police Operations-Western Mindanao, said the police have received intelligence reports about a bombing plot by a terror group allied with the regional terrorist organization Jemaah Islamiya.

He said in December alone, more than 17 bombs were planted in Central Mindanao and Cotabato City, some went off while others were defused.