BIFF admits role in latest attacks in Maguindanao

MAGUINDANAO, Philippines - The brigand Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF) on Monday claimed responsibility for the attacks on strategic Army positions including the attempt to bomb a roadside detachment in the province in the past three days.  

Abu Misry Mama, spokesman of BIFF, said their fighters were behind the atrocities.

He said the attacks were in retaliation for the military’s offensives two weeks ago that flushed bandits out of their lairs along riverbanks at the border of Pikit, North Cotabato and Datu Piang, Maguindanao.

“There will be a counter-attack for every attack by the military,” Mama told reporters.

Captain Joan Petinglay, public affairs chief of the Army’s 6th Infantry Division, said military units in Maguindanao have imposed tighter security measures to restrain the BIFF.

The group is comprised of rouge guerillas, mostly wanted for various criminal offenses.

Three soldiers were slightly wounded when BIFF bandits on Friday night fired assault rifles and 40 millimeter grenade projectiles at an Army detachment in Mamasapano town in the second district of the province.  

The bandits scampered away carrying six wounded companions when the soldiers returned fire, preventing them from breaching through the fence encircling the detachment.

Two more Army combatants were wounded Saturday night when BIFF gunmen attacked a detachment of the 2nd Mechanized Battalion in Datu Saudi town, also in the second district of Maguindanao.

The bandits retreated to a nearby hinterland when soldiers inside the detachment simultaneously fired .50 caliber machineguns to prevent them from closing in.

Another group of BIFF bandits on Sunday night attempted to set off fragmentation grenades inside a roadside Army outpost in Datu Salibo town in southwest of the province.  

The blasting contraption of the rusty grenades the bandits hurled inside the fenced detachment malfunctioned, preventing what could have been deadly explosions.