Sunday, March 20, 2016

7 hurt in Bicol blasts

From Tempo (Mar 21): 7 hurt in Bicol blasts

Five soldiers and two civilians were injured in two separate explosions perpetrated by the New People’s Army in Bicol over the weekend, the military said yesterday.
Lt. Col. Angelo Guzman, spokesman of the Armed Forces of the Philippines Southern Luzon Command, said among the wounded was an Army officer identified as 2nd Lt. Jonathan O. Baay of the 31st Infantry Battalion.
 
Guzman said that Baay was hit by fragments from an improvised explosive device explosion during a five-minute encounter with a group of NPA guerrillas during combat operations in Gubat, Sorsogon at around 10:15 a.m. Saturday.
 
In Labo, Camarines Norte, four soldiers and two military dependents were also wounded when an IED explosion hit a KM450 military truck around at around 8:30 a.m. yesterday.
 
Guzman said the KM450 truck, with the victims on board, was traversing Mahawan-hawan Road on its way to the Labo public market when the roadside explosion occurred.
 
The wounded soldiers were identified as Corporal Reynaldo V. Rivera and Privates First Class Ricky R. Obina, Rodelio D. Urbano Jr., and Carloj Z. Duriza. The military withheld the names of the two military dependents who were injured in the incident for security considerations.

The Bicol region was also rocked by other explosions last week.
 
Last Tuesday, 11 bomb explosions rocked the politically tense province of Masbate. Two policemen were wounded.

According to the Masbate provincial police office, the series of blasts were reported in Uson, Esperanza, Claveria, Mobo, Batuan, Balud, Masbate City, and at the boundary of San Jacinto and San Fernando.

The explosions occurred even as additional security forces have been deployed to the province to help ensure order and security in the May elections.

The military believes that the series of blasts in Masbate were also the handiwork of the NPA which is celebrating its 47th anniversary on March 29.

Solcom commander Lt. Gen. Ricardo R. Visaya said that “the NPA is a diminishing group in Southern Luzon, thus, they resort to terror acts like these IED explosions to project that they are still strong.”

http://www.tempo.com.ph/2016/03/21/news/news-roundup/7-hurt-in-bicol-blasts/

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