COTABATO CITY, Philippines — Members of the Moro National Liberation Front wounded a Moro Islamic Liberation Front member in a brief clash on Sunday morning in Sultan Kudarat town in Maguindanao.
Sulaiman Mingkot Macauyag of the MILF's 128th Base Command sustained bullet wounds in the upper torso and has been brought to a hospital.
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In an initial report to the Maguindanao provincial police office, Police Maj. Julhamin Asdani of the Sultan Kudarat municipal police said Macauyag was shot and wounded by MNLF gunmen led by a certain Commander Samad.
He said followers of Samad shot with assault rifles the houses in a farming community in Barangay Macaguiling in Sultan Kudarat, sparking a gunfight that left Macauyag wounded.
The gunmen escaped before police and personnel of the 2nd Marine Battalion arrived.
The incident, which caused panic among residents of Barangay Macaguiling, was preceded by a series of deadly encounters last month between rival MILF and MNLF forces in Matalam and in Pikit, both in North Cotabato, and in interior barangays in Guindulungan, Maguindanao.
Most serious were the hostilities in Pikit, which displaced no fewer than 2,000 impoverished Moro families.
More than 50 houses were looted and set on fire by the feuding groups in one encounter after another in three barangays in Pikit, located in the first district of North Cotabato.