Opinion: Terrorists in their midst?

Opinion piece in the Philippine Star (Mar 8, 2022): Terrorists in their midst? (By Ramon T. Tulfo)

SENTINEL - Ramon T. Tulfo

It seems the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) is trying to appease the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) after government troops killed three suspected terrorists in the rebel group’s area of responsibility.

MILF chief and Bangsamoro region interim Chief Minister Ahod “Al Haj Murad” Ibrahim has claimed that government soldiers engaged MILF rebels, not terrorists.

But the AFP insists that the armed men that its soldiers killed were remnants of the Maute group, which is espousing an Islamic State (IS).

The Maute group held Marawi City for several months before the city was recaptured by the government after a five-month-long fighting in 2017.

But should the government adopt a servile attitude towards the MILF, which apparently was coddling the suspected terrorists in the first place?

It was impossible for the MILF to not know that there were terrorists in its midst.

Just because the government is having peace talks with the MILF, does it have to be submissive to the rebel group?

“Our dear constituents in Maguing, Lanao del Sur have been troubled from military airstrikes and most recently firefight incidents that involved the military and forces of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front,” a statement from Ibrahim read.

AFP spokesman Col. Ramon Zagala gave a conciliatory reply: “The MILF is our partner in peace. They will never be our target. I would like to assure [Ibrahim] that our target was the Daulah Islamiyah.”

Brig. Gen. Jose Maria Cuerpo, commander of the Army’s 103rd Brigade, chimed in: What was raided by government troops was an IS camp near an MILF community in Ilalag.

If the IS camp was “near” the MILF territory, why didn’t the rebel group report the presence of terrorists to the government as a sign of good faith?

It’s very clear the MILF is coddling the Maute terrorists.

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Let’s face it: MILF rebels butchered the 44 members of the Special Action Force (SAF) on Jan. 25, 2016, after the hapless government troops raided a rebel territory to capture Zulkifli Abdhir, a Malaysian terrorist and bomb-maker in Mamasapano in 2016, dead or alive.

The SAF troopers killed Abdhir.

Obviously, the MILF was coddling Abdhir and the reason they made mincemeat of the police commandos was they wandered into their territory.

The government, which was then under Noynoy Aquino, didn’t blame the MILF for the massacre, careful not to upset the peace process.

Although the government would not admit it, the country is in a state of belligerency where places held by rebels are off-limits to government troops....

https://www.philstar.com/opinion/2022/03/08/2165668/terrorists-their-midst