NPA rebels attack troops in Zamboanga province

Communist rebels attacked patrolling soldiers conducting anticoronavirus information drive in Zamboanga del Norte province in southern Philippines, officials said. According to the officials, the attack sparked a firefight in the village of Pange in Siayan town over the weekend.

The clash lasted over half an hour and stopped after rebels broke into smaller groups and fled.

No soldiers were wounded or killed in the fighting.

It was unknown whether the New People’s Army (NPA) rebels suffered casualties.

Soldiers recovered improvised explosives and a blasting cap, including a map showing locations of rebel targets in the town, left behind by the gunmen, according to Lt Col. Manaros

Boransing, commander of the 97th Infantry Battalion.

Last month, rebel forces torched heavy equipment owned by a private contractor working on a road project in the village of Lower Liason in Tambulig town in the neighbouring province of Zamboanga del Sur.

Col. Leonel Nicolas, commander of the 102nd Infantry Brigade, said there were at least 100 national and local government flagship projects in the Zamboanga Peninsula and in Misamis Occidental, which they were now securing against the NPA.

Maj. Gen. Generoso Ponio, commander of the 1st Infantry

Division, said the rebel group violated their own unilateral ceasefire and the attack just showed the treacherous action of the NPA.

“Our troops will continue to perform our mandate in mitigating the spread of the Covid-19 (coronavirus disease) in partnership with local governments as we protect the constituents and ensure an unhampered implementation of government flagship projects,” he added.

The NPA has been fighting the democratic government for many decades now so it can put up its own communist state in the country.