BIFF members kill 7 farmers in separate attacks

MAGUINDANAO, Philippines — Members of the outlawed Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF) killed seven poor farmers in separate attacks in two Maguindanao towns shortly before sunrise on Thursday.

Police and military sources said BIFF gunmen killed five farmers while on their way to their farms in northwest of Ampatuan town in the second district of Maguindanao.

The bandits appeared from one side of the road and opened fire at the farmers carrying knapsack sprayers and farm tools.

Another group of BIFF bandits also shot dead two more farmers in secluded barangay in Esperanza town in Sultan Kudarat province, not far from Ampatuan town.

Capt. Joann Petinglay, spokesperson of the Army’s 6th Infantry Division, said the BIFF attack started with the harassment of a detachment of the 33rd IB in Datu Abdullah Sangki, also in Maguindanao, early Thursday, provoking a firefight with soldiers guarding the facility.

Responding soldiers had killed four BIFF bandits in an ensuing encounter.

The commanding officer of the 33rd IB, Lt. Col. Ricky Bunayog, and local officials in Datu Abdullah Sangki said villagers saw the fleeing bandits carry four dead companions as they fled towards a swampy area in south of the municipality.

Three BIFF bandits, initially identified only as Salik, Tato. and Tangan, were shot and wounded by soldiers while fleeing from the scene.

Petinglay said the cadavers of the slain farmers were turned over to their respective families.

The spokesperson of the brigand BIFF, Abu Misry Mama, said their forces perpetrated the attacks to disprove assertions they have been weakened tactically by military offensives from February 28 to May 3 this year in Maguindanao.