Ranking BIFF member die in Maguindanao del Sur clash

COTABATO CITY, Philippines — Soldiers shot dead a senior member of the outlawed Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters and arrested his father in an encounter in Mamasapano town in Maguindanao del Sur before dawn Monday.

In a report on Wednesday to the Army’s 6th Infantry Division, Lt. Col. Udgie Villan of the Army’s 33 Infantry Battalion identified the slain BIFF member as Mohammad Nanding, who died on the spot from multiple bullet wounds sustained in the clash.

Nanding’s patriarch, Mah Nanding, yielded peacefully after soldiers felled his long wanted son with assault rifles when he opened fire at one of the two Army teams approaching their hideout in Barangay Pidsandawan in Mamasapano to check on reports by villagers about the presence of gunmen in the area, forcibly collecting money and food from hapless farmers.

The local police and the 33rd IB reported that soldiers found a 5.56 M653 assault rifle, a knife and a binocular beside Nanding’s body.

The 33rd IB immediately turned over Nanding’s father to the Radjah Buayan Municipal Police Station in nearby Radjah Buayan town, also in Maguindanao del Sur, for detention and subsequent prosecution. He and his slain son are both wanted for multiple murder, arson and extortion cases pending in different courts.

Villagers had confirmed to reporters that Nanding was a longtime member of the BIFF and that his detained father is a municipal sub-leader of the group, which has a reputation for attacking business establishments and bombing buses if owners refuse to shell out money.