PAGADIAN CITY – Army soldiers clashed
with a group of pro-ISIS militants and killing one gunman in Lanao del Sur, one
of 5 provinces under the restive Muslim autonomous region, officials said
Saturday.
Officials said soldiers from the 82nd
Infantry Battalion tracked down members of the Dawlah Islamiya on a hinterland
village near Piagapo town and clashed with the militants.
“Troops recovered the body of the slain
militant who was identified from his old school ID as 28-year old Jarir Usman,”
Capt. Clint Antipala, a spokesman for the 1st Infantry Division,
told The Zamboanga Post.
Antipala, quoting a report by
battalion commander Lt. Col. Rafman Altre, said soldiers also seized Usman’s
automatic rifle, four improvised explosives, two kilos of suspected chemicals
used in manufacturing homemade explosives, and a cell phone, including documents
described as having “high intelligence value.”
He said Altre reported that Usman was
a former college student of Mindanao State University and a native of Marawi
City.
Military photos released to The Zamboanga Post by the 1st Infantry Division show the slain militant Jarir S. Usman and weapons and improvised explosives, including his old school ID, recovered by troops.
Antipala said no soldiers were killed
or wounded in the fighting that lasted 15 minutes, but at least 8 militants
managed to escape the clash and were being hunted down. “No government forces
was hurt, and possible number of enemies were wounded based on the traces of
bloodstains in their withdrawal route. Pursuit operation is conducted to neutralize
the remaining terrorist,” he said.
It was not immediately known whether
the militants were planning a terror attack, but Brig. Gen. Generoso Ponio, the
division commander, lauded the soldiers for “neutralizing” Usman.
The Dawlah Islamiya or Islamic State
was founded by Omar Maute, whose group laid siege to Marawi City in May 2017.
Maute and his brothers, and other militant leaders, including Abu Sayyaf
chieftain Isnilon, were eventually killed in the fighting that lasted 5 months.
But many militants, who managed to escape the massive military assault in
Marawi, recruited members and continue fighting for the establishment of a
caliphate in the southern Philippines. (Zamboanga Post)
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