Security officials raise alarm vs Jemaah Islamiyah terrorists in Mindanao

COTABATO CITY, Philippines—Police and military authorities have called for public vigilance in Central Mindanao and nearby areas in light of a “renewed threat” from armed groups suspected to be allied with the Jemaah Islamiyah.

Colonel Prudencio Asto, spokesperson of the military’s 6th Infantry Division, said the threat was real and this was manifested in Monday’s explosion in Kidapawan City in North Cotabato and a foiled bomb attack—on the same day—in Sultan Kudarat province.

“We needed the public’s cooperation,” Asto said. “Vigilance is the key to preventing any bomb attack.”

Asto maintained that the explosion inside the provincial capitol of North Cotabato and the foiled attempt in Sultan Kudarat were the work of new recruits of an armed group headed by Basit Usman, whom he described as a terrorist bomber trained in Afghanistan.

Usman was reportedly killed in January last year during a US drone air strike in the Afghan-Pakistani border. But the military later reported he was sighted in Mindanao.

Chief Superintendent Benjardi Mantele, police regional director for Central Mindanao, said that an hour after the Kidapawan City explosion, policemen in Sultan Kudarat  intercepted in Barangay (village) Ducay, Esperanza,  a powerful improvised explosive device hidden in a sack at the back of a Toyota Hi-Ace passenger van with license plate MUV-321.

“The van was traveling from Cotabato City to Isulan or Koronadal or General Santos City,” Mantele said in a radio interview.

He said several persons have been invited for questioning by the Sultan Kudarat police.

The IED, fashioned from 81-millimeter and 60-millimeter mortar shells, were fitted with a mobile phone as trigger mechanism.

Asto said the rash of bombings in Central Mindanao—made up of North Cotabato, Sultan Kudarat, South Cotabato and Sarangani provinces and the cities of General Santos, Cotabato, Kidapawan, Koronadal and Tacurong—and nearby Maguindanao could be a test mission for JI-trained bombers.

“These are the handiworks of recruits who were out on a baptism of fire,” Asto told reporters.

Asto also noted that the bombings occur every time talks between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front take place but he refused to speculate further.