2 killed, 9 wounded in rebel attacks in Mindanao

MAKILALA, North Cotabato, Philippines—Two soldiers were killed while nine other people were injured in separate attacks by New People’s Army rebels here and in the Davao area, military officials said Saturday.

In Barangay Batasan here, NPA rebels ambushed three soldiers in civilian clothes, who were on their way to the town center to get food supplies early Friday, said Lieutenant Manuel Gatus, civil-military operations officer of the Army’s 57th Infantry Battalion.

Gatus said only one soldier was armed at the time of the ambush, which also resulted in the wounding of the two others.

He identified the slain soldier as Pfc Alex Calon and the wounded troopers as Pfc Dan Garbo and Cpl Sarip Hassan.

In Panabo City in Davao del Norte, seven people, including two civilians, were injured when communist rebels lobbed a grenade into an Army detachment on Friday, said Col. Leopoldo Galon, spokesperson of the Eastern Mindanao Command based in Davao City.

Galon said the attack occurred in Barangay San Roque around 6 p.m. It was not clear what the civilians were doing at the detachment.

In Davao City, NPA rebels fired at and killed an unarmed soldier  who was driving his children and a nephew to school in Paquibato district on Thursday morning, according to Maj. Jacob Obligado, spokesperson of the Army’s 10th Infantry Division.

Obligado said the attack on Cpl Wenie Carampatana showed that the rebels do not distinguish between armed and unarmed targets.

“The attack also endangered the lives of the children but they did not care,” he said.

Reports from Williamor A. Magbanua, Frinston L. Lim and Dennis Jay C. Santos, Inquirer Mindanao