Alleged NPA rebels shoot dead Bicol cops;

VIRAC, Catanduanes — New People’s Army hit men shot dead the assistant police provincial director of Catanduanes as he was leaving the gate of the cockpit in Barangay Valencia Sunday afternoon here, the police said yesterday.

Police Chief Inspector Loreto Tablizo, Jr., was about to leave the Araojo cockpit at about 5 p.m. when alleged Communist assassins armed with cal. 45 pistols and 9 mm handguns fired suddenly and peppered him with bullets, hitting him in the head and right chest, Bicol police regional director Jaime Lasar said. The police officer, reports said, was a cockfight aficionado.

Lasar said the victim slumped to the ground after he was hit but his aide PO1 Noel Tabor was able to fire at the alleged NPA hitmen, prompting an exchange of gunfire after which the suspects fled toward the direction of West Garden and Imperial Homes subdivision.

Tablizo was rushed to the Bicol Eastern Medical Hospital minutes later and doctors at the emergency department tried frantically to stop the bleeding to no avail. The victim expired a few minutes later.

The gunfire forced the on-going sultada to stop after cockfight aficionados scampered for safety while others sought cover.

Earlier, NPA rebels shot dead SPO3 Pedro Roslim in a hilly portion of Barangay Camburo in Pandan town. Roslim was riding a motorcycle when about eight NPA rebels fired at him as he passed by while reporting for work at the Pandan police station from his house in Caramoran town. The rebels took his 9mm service firearm, police reports said.

With mounting atrocities, Lasar has immediately ordered the provincial police mobile group to go after Tablizo’s killers and ordered the provincial command, in coordination with the 901st Infantry Brigade under Brig. Gen. Pedro Magsino, to conduct more operations against the NPAs in the island province.

President Arroyo announced last week that Manila would resume "exploratory" peace negotiations in Oslo shortly with the NPA’s political organization after Norway offered to broker a new round of talks.

Arroyo suspended the talks last year after the NPA killed two lawmakers. — Celso Amo, AFP