The Philippine Army captured over the weekend the main camp of the jihadists group Khilafah Islamiyah Movement (KIM) at the hinterland of Butig town in Lanao del Sur, officials said Monday.
Clearing operations, however, was under way on Monday and it
was not clear when will the place be declared safe as there was continuous
intermittent firefight between the military and the rebel group.
Col. Roseller Murillo, commander of Marawi City-based 103rd
Infantry Brigade of the Philippine Army, confirmed to The Manila Times
that the camp is located in Poktan, an adjacent village of Bubong
Several
weapons and equipment were recovered from the sites, including an M-16 rifle, a
recoiled propelled grenade launcher, a 50-caliber locally made Barrett sniper’s
rifle and several explosives.
The bodies of an unidentified man, with a handy metal scrap embedded with Arabic script of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), and another man wearing a uniform of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), were also found by the army.
The MILF, which signed peace agreements with the government,
had earlier disowned some Islamist fighters, who could be relatives and were
possibly disgruntled upon the non-passage of the Bangsamoro Basic Law (BBL) in
Congress.
Other casualties from the military’s opponents remained
elusive while government soldiers endured six fatalities and nine others with
injuries since the skirmishes began.
In recent reports, the military said there were 24 confirmed
dead from the rebels based on information corroborated by the local government
units of Butig.
Among reported killed were leader of the group identified as
Omar Maute, his young brother Matti, and a certain Indonesian national, whose
bodies were not recovered. Maute’s family denied the claims.
The soldiers vowed “nonstop” pursuit operations against the
Maute brothers’ forces, whom they branded as “foreign and local terrorist group
(FLTO)” being blamed for the previous atrocities in Lanao del Sur and nearby
provinces.
Not terrorists
A jihadists’ cleric in Lanao del Sur issued a statement to the public over the
weekend, saying their forces are not terrorists but pure mujahideens (soldiers
of Islam), who are fighting for the establishment of an Islamic State.
“To all our Muslim brothers and sisters in Lanao, we want to
let you know that we are fighting in the name of Islam, and that we are legal
mujahideen (soldiers of Islam) and not terrorists,” Jamil Yahya announced on
Sunday. “We are aiming for the establishment of Islamic State.”
He added, “Our enemies had stolen our lands by force,
particularly Lanao, and that only a fearless jihad (struggle) could regain it
until an Islamic Shariah law is implemented. It is the obligation of all
Muslims to support jihad through any means like wealth, work and words, as even
we diminished, Islam is still intact.”
Yahya is among the Muslim clerics who had pledged allegiance
to the ISIS in Marawi
City
KIM members had backed Yahya’s baiah, or his pledge
of allegiance, by hoisting the black flag of ISIS
inside a mosque, an incident that the military and the police had investigated.
KIM founding members headed by Humam Abdul Najid remained
at-large, although authorities were eyeing their involvement in an ambush in Wato-Balindong last
Tuesday that resulted to the death of a soldier responding to the Butig
clashes.
KIM was holding training Sunday for new recruits at their
main camp, in Poktan, whose capture was led by a certain cleric Abu Jamal, who
is running an Islamic school in this city.
Local residents in Poktan said the group was also recruiting
minors with ages 12 to 18, to fight under the banner of the ISIS
before the clashes erupted.
The skirmishes in Lanao del Sur started on February 20, when
a military detachment was harassed by undetermined numbers of gunmen hoisting
the flag of ISIS (or Daesh), which controls swaths of land in Iraq
and Syria
Thousands of local residents in Butig were displaced by the
hostilities.
http://www.manilatimes.net/breaking_news/jihadists-camp-in-lanao-del-sur-falls/
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