MILF told: Return other SAF guns

MANILA, Philippines - A military mutineer-turned-congressman urged the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) yesterday to return the other firearms of the 44 policemen who were killed in the Mamasapano incident on Jan. 25.

“They have so far returned only 16. They should return the other firearms, equipment and personal belongings of the dead Special Action Force (SAF) troopers,” Rep. Francisco Ashley Acedillo of party-list group Magdalo told a news forum in Quezon City.

Based on an inventory that he has seen, he said the 44 SAF members who died in clashes with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) lost 62 assorted firearms.

“The MILF has a responsibility to cooperate with the government, with which it has signed a peace agreement,” he said.

According to an inventory made by SAF officer-in-charge Chief Superintendent Noli Taliño, the lost firearms included 30 Ferfrans caliber 5.56mm SOAR (special operations assault rifle), a variant of the M4 carbine with improvements and modifications used by special forces of the US military.

There were also two Rock River caliber 5.56mm rifles, which are similar to M4s; and four Savage caliber 7.62mm sniper rifles, which fire a bigger and more deadly round than the M16 or M4’s 5.56mm bullet.

Also lost were 10 Ferfrans M203 grenade launchers, two M60 caliber 7.62mm light machine guns, two Negev caliber 5.56mm light machine guns, two Beretta 9mm, one CZ 75 9mm and eight Glock 17 9mm pistols, and one 90mm recoilless rifle.

The missing “special equipment” were six pieces of sound suppressor, one forward looking infrared, seven night vision goggles (NVG), four night-fighting devices, four generation 3 night vision monocular, two NVG head mounts, one laser bore sight, four carbine infrared lasers, four laser device infrared pointers, 12 PEQ2 scopes, four Leupold scopes, seven GPS map 60s, five GPS Foretrex devices, four binoculars, 37 tactical helmets, four tactical vests, 79 ceramic plates (for bulletproof vests), 15 gas masks with canisters, and four protective clear glasses.

Twenty-one communications gadgets, mostly Harris and Motorola radios, are also missing, along with two combat casualty response kits and 16 individual patrol officers’ kits.

Also lost or used by the 44 dead SAF troopers were 28,400 rounds of ammunition for caliber 5.56mm rifles and machine guns, 4,100 rounds for caliber 7.62mm weapons, 5,700 for caliber 9mm, eight rounds for the recoilless rifle, 150 rounds for grenade launchers, 20 hand grenades, and 638 pieces of assorted ammunition magazines.

Of the 16 firearms returned by the MILF, two were light machine guns, 13 were M4 assault rifles and one was the upper part of an M4.

The STAR, quoting a military source, has reported the returned guns had been cannibalized.

ABS-CBN News Channel reported that one of the 13 M4s was the rifle issued to PO2 Joseph Sagonoy of Eastern Samar, who was seen in a video being finished off by an unidentified man with two close-range shots to the head from a pistol.

Acedillo chided chief government peace negotiator Miriam Coronel-Ferrer for reportedly saying it was possible that Sagonoy’s rifle was picked up by a civilian who turned it over to the MILF, which then included it among the firearms returned to the PNP. 

“She sounded as if she was speaking for the MILF, absolving it of culpability in this incident. The fact that PO2 Sagonoy’s rifle was among those returned by the MILF shows that they were the ones responsible for the killing of the 44 SAF troopers,” he said. –  With Christina Mendez, Paolo Romero