VIDEO | Into the breach: Norwegian peacekeeper recalls how IMT helped end Mamasapano battle

From InterAksyon (Feb 2): VIDEO | Into the breach: Norwegian peacekeeper recalls how IMT helped end Mamasapano battle



William Hovland, the Norwegian operations chief of the International Monitoring Team (image grabbed from News5 video)

As combat raged around them, William Hovland said he and other members of the International Monitoring Team had to crawl their way between pinned down commandos of the police Special Action Force and fighters of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front in Barangay Tukanalipao, Mamasapano, Maguindanao.

Hovlan, the Norwegain operations chief of the IMT, the multinational body tasked to ensure the ceasefire between the government and MILF holds, said they reached the scene of battle around noon of that fateful Sunday, January 25.

But because of problems with mobile phone signals in the area, he said it was only after they had physically placed themselves in between the battling forces were they finally able to get both sides to agree to cease firing.

By then, it was already 3 p.m., he said, almost 12 hours since the SAF mounted the disastrous operation intended to get Malaysian Zulkifli bin Hir, alias “Marwan,” and Filipino Abudl Basit Usman, bomb-making experts with a combined $7-million bounty from the US.

At the end of the day, the death toll was horrendous: 44 SAF commandos, the largest single combat loss for government in recent history, 14 MILF fighters and at least two civilians.

For his efforts, the Office of the Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process has recognized Hovland.

[Video report]

http://www.interaksyon.com/article/104195/video--into-the-breach-norwegian-peacekeeper-recalls-how-imt-helped-end-mamasapano-battle