Mopping up in Marawi

Filipino soldiers closing in on 30 militants in Marawi city

Philippine troops battle last remaining militants in city.

MANILA: Philippine troops were battling a final group of about 30 pro-Islamic State group militants who were surrounded in one building with all their hostages gone as a nearly five-month siege neared its end in southern Marawi city, a military official said.

Army Col Romeo Brawner said troops were aiming to end the crisis before midnight yesterday. He said the remaining gunmen, who include some Indonesian and Malaysian fighters, have the option of surrendering, or they can either be captured or killed.

“Our government forces will try to do everything to finish the battle today,” Brawner said in Marawi. He said the battle area centred in a two-storey building near Lake Lanao where armed clashes continued to rage at noon.

“It’s either they all get killed, because they’re determined to die inside, or we capture them or they surrender,” he said.

A gradual withdrawal of military forces was underway with the easing of the fighting, which has left at least 1,131 people dead, including 919 militants and 165 soldiers and policemen.

Troops continued to ask the gunmen, who are leaderless and running low on ammunition, to surrender by using loudspeakers, Brawner said.

Military chief of staff Gen Eduardo Ano said some of the remaining militants were “suicidal”.

Hundreds of militants, many waving Islamic State group-style black flags, launched the siege on May 23 in Marawi, a bastion of Islamic faith in the south of the largely Roman Catholic Philippines, by seizing the lakeside city’s central business district and outlying communities.

At least 1,780 of the hostages seized by the militants, including a Roman Catholic priest, were rescued, and a final group of 20 captives were freed overnight, Brawner said. That left the gunmen with none of the hostages they had used as human shields to slow the military advance for months.