COTABATO City, Philippines - Gunmen burned down three houses as they harassed a farming village near the town proper Montawal in Maguindanao province on Thursday night.
Local officials are certain the attackers are members of a family locked in a standing “rido” or clan war with Andi Montawal, an older brother of Montawal’s incumbent municipal mayor.
Forces of both families have clashed for at least five times, using assault rifles and shoulder-fire grenades from October to December 2012.
The hostilities between the two groups erupted when Montawal and his followers killed in a shootout a member of the other clan in an earlier incident in a nearby town in North Cotabato.
The two groups have since been fighting each other in encounters, displacing innocent villagers.