Communist rebels raid Benguet police outpost

LA TRINIDAD, Benguet — Without any shots fired, communist rebels overran a police sub-station in barangay Loo, Buguias town in northern Benguet Tuesday evening.

An NPA unit under the New People's Army's t Command Benguet barged into the police sub-station at around 9 in the evening and took a 9mm Bereta pistol, four magazines, an M14 magazine, a hand grenade, holsters, pouch, two VHF radios, and military uniforms.

The attack was the second siege of a police outpost this year by the NPA in Cordillera. The NPA command claimed the move "was a punitive action for the crimes committed by the Philippine National Police against the people and the revolutionary movement."

Last month, rebels overran the remote Malibcong town police station in Abra, held four policemen on duty for an hour and carted away their high-powered firearms and equipment.

Reinforcing policemen including the provincial police director, Senior Superintendent Alexander Tagum, now Davao police director, were ambushed on their way to the "raided" police station, wounding two policemen.

Benguet communist rebels claimed Buguias policemen, "are notorious for committing crimes against the masses," citing among others, that policemen allegedly randomly stop motorists plying the highway "in order to extort bribes."

Most of these motorists are gardeners bringing their vegetable harvest to market. "The bribe money extorted by the police adds to the already heavy burden of the gardeners struggling under the high prices of farm inputs and fluctuating prices of their produce," the NPA said.

The Buguias police force, the Benguet NPAs also claimed, are "involved in the sale of illegal drugs and other anti-social activities such as the operation of bars."

The Benguet NPA command also rapped the Buguias police force for the alleged torture and death of NPA member Antonio Licawen in 2005, in Barangay Bad-ayan, after he had been injured and had already surrendered to the police.

NPA rebels along the boundaries of Abra, Mt. Province, Ilocos Sur and Benguet made the Licawen, whose nom de guerre was "Ka Leyap," as its command's name.