35 hurt in Digos City bus blast

DIGOS CITY – A bomb blast tore through a passenger bus in a busy terminal in this Davao del Sur capital yesterday, wounding 35 people, military and police officials said.

Maj. Armand Rico, spokesman of the Armed Forces Eastern Mindanao Command, denied earlier reports that three people were killed in the explosion that ripped through the Metro Shuttle bus that came from Bansalan town, also in Davao del Sur, en route to Davao City.

Digos police told reporters a bomb most likely caused the explosion, and either Muslim militants or communist guerrillas could have planted it.

Ambulances raced to Digos from nearby Davao City and other areas to take the victims to hospitals, an AFP reporter on the scene said.

Chief Superintendent Andres Caro, Southern Mindanao police director, said five of the victims were brought to the Davao Medical Center, and the rest to different hospitals in Digos. As of press time, four were undergoing surgery while another one was confined at the Davao Medical Center’s burn unit for further treatment.

Lt. Kurt Decapia, a local military spokesman, said soldiers were deployed to help police secure the area.

Mayor Rey Uy of Tagum City, Davao del Norte, who owns the Metro Shuttle bus company, said extortionists were behind the attack, as they have received several demand letters.

On Wednesday, police disarmed a motorcycle rigged with explosives near Ampatuan town in Maguindanao. The vehicle had been abandoned at a roadside after it suffered a flat tire.

They said they received information that the motorcycle was intended to bomb Davao City. It is unclear if the two incidents were related.

Last year, a bomb went off in a Weena bus in Bansalan town, killing several people. The Al-Khobar extortion gang owned up to the attack.

Hundreds of troops were sent this week to Mindanao to tackle a rapid rise in communist guerrilla attacks on civilian targets.

The New People’s Army, the armed wing of the Communist Party of the Philippines, has been waging a 39-year armed campaign in the country.

Western Mindanao is also a hotbed of a decades-old Muslim separatist insurgency, although a ceasefire is in effect amid peace talks.