Clashes with NPA rebels leave 8 dead

Skirmishes between government troops and New People’s Army (NPA) rebels this week left at least eight people dead, police said yesterday.

Army troops encountered a group of New People’s Army guerrillas in Barangay San Francisco, San Antonio, Nueva Ecija last Tuesday, triggering a firefight that killed four rebels and one soldier, and wounded another soldier, according to a police field report made available to the media.

A day earlier, soldiers clashed with 10 heavily armed guerrillas in a nearby village, with no casualties reported, according to the report.

In Benguet, patrolling policemen shot dead two suspected NPA rebels and captured five others in a clash in Baculongan Sur, Buguias town last Monday, Chief Superintendent Noe Wong, Cordillera police director, said.

Philippine National Police chief Director General Arturo Lomibao, who was at Camp Dangwa in La Trinidad, Benguet’s capital town yesterday, awarded medals and announced the promotions to the next higher rank of the 12 policemen involved in the clash.

In Albay, members of the Army’s 65th Infantry Battalion, on combat patrol in Guinobatan town, clashed the same day with communist guerrillas, killing one and arresting another, Chief Superintendent Victor Boco said.

Two Army soldiers were wounded last Monday in Agusan del Sur when rebels ambushed soldiers in a military jeep, Boco said.

Hours later, suspected NPA hit men shot dead a government militiaman in Talacogon town in Agusan del Sur, as he watched a bingo game near the town market.

The rebels fled after grabbing his M-16 rifle, police said in a separate field report.

The rebels earlier said they were willing to resume stalled peace talks if the government takes steps to remove the Communist Party and its armed wing from US and European terror lists. — AP, Artemio Dumlao, Ric Sapnu, Cecille Suerte Felipe, James Mananghaya and Ding Cervantes