By Carlos H. Conde
International Herald Tribune
The New York Times
Published: August 26, 2008
MANILA: Fighting in the southern Philippines between government troops and Islamic separatists is getting worse by the day, with the number of displaced people now reaching 300,000, officials and disaster volunteers said Tuesday.
Army officials estimated that 150 rebels from the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, the separatist group, were killed in the past five days and that government troops overran 15 rebel camps in one of the largest military offensives since peace negotiations began 11 years ago.
The military said the offensives, which have been taking place in several provinces in the southern region of Mindanao since last week, are specifically directed at three commands of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front that were responsible for attacks this month in which 33 people were killed.
Relief officials said most of the displaced were from Muslim areas.
Volunteer groups who are helping the refugees in Mindanao called on the government Tuesday to stop the offensives because of the worsening humanitarian crisis in many Muslim areas.
“We are calling for a cease-fire, for both sides to talk rather than shoot each other,” said Rexall Kaalim, an officer of Bantay Ceasefire, a volunteer group in Mindanao. He said that casualties were increasing and that refugees were dying or getting sick in evacuation centers.
Several reports since Monday indicated heavy fighting in at least two provinces, with airstrikes being carried out by the military regularly.
On its Web site, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front claimed it killed 13 soldiers since last week and also reported the downing of a helicopter gunship - assertions that the military had denied.
Gilbert Teodoro, the defense secretary, said Monday that the offensives would not stop until the three front commanders were captured. Arroyo advisers also said the peace negotiations would only resume if the commanders were turned over to the authorities. The front’s leadership said that would not happen.
The attacks followed the signing of a peace deal on Aug. 5, aborted since, that many Filipinos opposed. The fighting has left the peace process in tatters, although President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo has been trying to resuscitate it.
“There is no all-out war,” Arroyo said in a speech Monday. “What we are doing, we are doing to have all-out peace in Mindanao.”
Her administration, however, is exerting pressure on the 11,000-strong front, which has been fighting for Muslim self-rule since the 1970s. On Monday, Norberto Gonzales, the national security adviser, said that the front commanders responsible for the rampage this month had ties with Jemaah Islamiyah, the Southeast Asian terror network.
Separately, a C-130 transport plane from the Philippine Air Force carrying two pilots and seven crew members went missing Tuesday morning after taking off in Davao City.
Officials said they had recovered body parts and debris, including combat boots, from the waters of the Davao Gulf. The authorities are still verifying reports by fishermen in the area that they saw an aircraft plunging into the sea after it was hit by lightning.
