Reds claim holding 2 soldiers hostage

MALOLOS, Bulacan — The New People’s Army (NPA) has claimed holding two soldiers, including an Army lieutenant, hostage after a clash with government troops in Camarines Sur last March 2.

This developed as a 13-year-old girl and two rebels were killed and six others, including two soldiers, were wounded when 50 NPA rebels attacked an Army outpost in Monkayo, Compostela Valley yesterday morning, the military said.

Gregorio "Ka Roger" Rosal, spokesman of the Communist Party of the Philippines, identified their "prisoners of war" as Lt. Boots Sedelino, of the Army’s 42nd Infantry Battalion, and Pfc. Ronnel Leminio.

Rosal also claimed that NPA guerrillas killed three soldiers and seized two M203s and an M-14 during the encounter in Barangay Bataan in Tinambac, Camarines Sur.

Lt. Col. Daniel Lucero, Armed Forces’ information chief, said guerrillas belonging to the NPA’s Alex Rosette Front Committee, swooped down on the detachment of the Army’s 36th Infantry Battalion at the gold-rush area at Mt. Diwalwal in Monkayo town at about 5 a.m. yesterday.

The rebels, according to Lucero, also fired indiscriminately at the surrounding area, killing 13-year-old high school student Hannah Joy Villaber and wounding four other civilians. — With Benjie Villa, Roel Pareño, Edith Regalado and Jaime Laude