• GILBERT P. BAYORAN
Philippine Army soldiers pursuing the New People’s Army rebels they encountered on Nov. 21 overran a rebel camp yesterday, following another armed skirmish in the boundary of Candoni and Hinobaan towns in Negros Occidental.
Brig. Gen. Joey Escanillas, 302nd Infantry Brigade commander, said the rebel lair taken by joint forces of the 15th and 47th Infantry Battalions is equipped with structures which can accommodate up 20 persons.
Escanillas said the soldiers were approaching the area, when they were fired upon by the rebel occupants, which triggered the gunbattle.
Philippine Air Force helicopter gunships were utilized to dislodge the rebels occupying advantage positions, but later fled as soldiers pressed their attack, he added.
No casualty was reported on the government side.
The latest gunbattle was preceded by an encounter between 15IB soldiers on Nov. 22 in Sitio Soso, Barangay Gatuslao, Candoni, where an unidentified rebel also died.
This brought to eight the number of suspected rebels who were killed in encounters since Nov. 21, starting in Sitio Cogon, also in Barangay Gatuslao, where seven insurgents died.
Escanillas said he suspects that the dismantled South West Front of the Komiteng Rehiyonal Negros was beefed up by remnants of the dismantled South East Front, as one of the seven casualties in the Nov. 21 encounter came from Negros Oriental.
The first encounter led to the recovery of eight high-powered firearms, including five M16 automatic rifles, two AK 47 rifles and a M653 assault rifle, with hundreds of assorted ammunition and three rifle grenades.
In the next encounter, the soldiers recovered a caliber .45 pistol, two improvised explosive devices, two commercial radios, a bandoleer, 16 backpacks and subversive documents, Lt. Col. Bryan Bagaipo, acting 15th Infantry Battalion commander, said.
The mass burial of the six rebels on Nov. 22 at the public cemetery of Candoni, was facilitated by the 47IB, after the remains were not claimed by their respective families.
The body of the seventh rebel fatality in the Nov. 21 encounter, identified as Jonel Saroa Anicito of Sitio Makilo, Barangay Camansi, Kabankalan City, was claimed by a family member.
The identity of the eighth rebel fatality was not yet established.
In a statement, Maj. Gen. Marion Sison, 3rd Infantry Division commander, said that the focused military operations against the rebel remnants in Negros aims to deny them of space and opportunity to resurge.
All the five NPA guerrilla fronts in Negros Island have already been declared as dismantled by the Philippine Army. | GB
