Philippine troops 'kill 30 rebels, seize camp'
COTABATO, Philippines (AFP) — The Philippines' military said Saturday its troops had killed 30 Muslim separatist guerrillas in three days of fighting on the southern island of Mindanao.
Ground troops supported by artillery barrages and rocket-firing ground-attack aircraft seized the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) camp near the town of Guindulungan early Saturday, said Lieutenant-Colonel Jonathan Ponce, spokesman for an army division whose units took part in the fight.
He estimated that, in addition to the 30 dead, 20 wounded rebels escaped with the camp's defenders after they were routed by the assault that began Thursday. Earlier, the government reported that 13 rebels were killed.
Five soldiers were wounded in the successful operation, Ponce added.
"We used artillery and we used close air support, explaining the large casualty count," he said.
Soldiers retrieved some of the bodies from shallow graves dug by the rebels for their dead comrades, he said, explaining that Muslim custom required that the dead had to be buried before sundown.
The 12,000-member MILF, however, denied suffering any casualties, and accused the military of setting fire to the homes of Muslim families in Guindulungan.
"The soldiers torched the houses after they failed to find any rebels in the area," MILF spokesman Eid Kabalu told reporters in a conference call.
"Muslims are fleeing their homes because they are scared of the soldiers who are notorious for their human rights records," Kabalu claimed.
Ponce said soldiers found bunkers, an administration building, foxholes and reinforced trenches around the captured training camp, along with "improvised explosive devices," munitions and MILF uniforms.
He said the group was behind the sacking of a string of Christian communities in Mindanao last year that touched off a major humanitarian crisis by displacing at least half a million people from their homes.
The pillage followed a Supreme Court ruling that outlawed a draft peace agreement between the MILF and President Gloria Arroyo's government. The deal offered Muslim rule over large areas of the south of mainly Roman Catholic Philippines.
Earlier Saturday, the military reported that an Islamic militant was killed and another captured on the southern island of Basilan when marine troops attacked a jungle hideout of the Abu Sayyaf near Tipo-Tipo town Friday.
The Abu Sayyaf is alleged by the military to have received financing from the Al-Qaeda network of Osama bin Laden and provided training facilities for Jemaah Islamiyah militants operating elsewhere in Southeast Asia.
The Abu Sayyaf has been blamed for some of the worst terrorist attacks in the Philippines, including the fire-bombing of a ferry on Manila Bay that claimed more than 100 lives in 2004.
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Según el ejército de ese país, pasados tres días de combates, los soldados lograron tomar el control de un campamento de separatistas musulmanes dejando un saldo de 30 insurgentes muertos y al menos otros 20 heridos, al igual que cinco militares. Según los rebeldes, ninguno de sus campamentos ha sido ocupado.

Jonathan Ponce, vocero del ejército, aseguró que el campamento del Frente Moro de Liberación Islámica (MILF por sus siglas en inglés) se encontraba en la provincia de Maguindanao, en la isla Mindanao, al sur del archipiélago. Este contaba con 20 casamatas en las que 200 personas podrían ser alojadas.

Ponce dijo además que contaba con una fábrica de bombas y que fueron recuperados explosivos y municiones, y, como los musulmanes se encontraban "bien atrincherados", fue necesario hacer uso de artillería pesada.

Eid Kabalu, vocero del MILF, ha dicho que ninguno de sus campamentos ha sufrido ataque alguno, y que la zona era una aldea; además, no han muerto 30 de sus miembros, sólo han habido nueve heridos.

Durante las últimas semanas, más de 50.000 familias se han desplazado de sus hogares debido a los constantes combates entre el ejército y los separatistas.