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AFP: Muslim rebels locked in standoff with Philippine army
BBC News - Philippine rebels in deadly attack in Zamboanga
BBC News - Philippine rebel attack in Zamboanga kills soldier
Filipino rebels storm villages, take hostages
Muslim rebels locked in standoff with Philippine army
(AFP) 5 hours ago
ZAMBOANGA, Philippines Philippine troops were locked in a standoff with hundreds of Muslim gunmen who killed six people and took at least 20 hostages in the south on Monday in a bid to derail peace talks.
Armoured troops surrounded the southern port city of Zamboanga after between 200 and 300 Moro National Liberation Front gunmen entered six coastal villages on its outskirts before dawn, military spokesman Lieutenant-Colonel Ramon Zagala said.
"They were trying to march on the city hall and we cannot allow that," he told a news conference in Manila, adding that two gunmen were arrested.
President Benigno Aquino's government denounced the deadly attack, which analysts said was designed to sabotage peace talks aimed at ending a 42-year-old rebellion that has claimed 150,000 lives.
"The authorities are responding to the situation in a manner that will reduce the risk to innocent civilians and restore peace and order to Zamboanga City at the soonest possible time," Aquino spokesman Edwin Lacierda said in a statement.
Loud explosions could be heard around the former colonial Spanish port of nearly one million people.
Streets were deserted and shops, schools and government offices as well as the airport were shut down.
Heavily armed private security personnel as well as troops guarded the airport, hotels, banks and other buildings, said an AFP reporter on the ground.
"We can still hear sporadic gunshots. We don't know if this is from the government forces or from the MNLF," city hall employee Ramon Bucoy said.
Zamboanga mayor Maria Isabelle Climaco-Salazar said two security forces and four civilians had been killed and 1,500 people fled their homes.
The military and police said at least 20 people had been taken hostage.
Footage on local ABS-CBN television showed armoured personnel carriers speeding around empty streets at dawn, with road blocks also prominent.
The attack came as the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front prepared to resume talks aimed at crafting a political settlement to be signed before Aquino leaves office in 2016.
After a preliminary peace deal was signed last year, the remaining negotiations aim to flesh out the power-sharing terms between the national government and the MILF that is expected to head a new autonomous government, and the disarmament of its 12,000 guerrillas.
Rommel Banlaoi, executive director of the Manila security think-tank Philippine Institute for Peace, Violence, and Terrorism Research, which has extensively covered the conflict, said the action was likely designed to sabotage the peace talks.
"(MNLF leader Nur) Misuari's motive is to convey a message... (that) the signing of the peace agreement between the government and the MILF will no longer guarantee the end of war".
He added: "The fear now is Misuari could create one united front along with other threat groups against the Philippines."
Misuari had made a renewed call last month for an independent Islamic state in the southern Philippines.
"To the Philippine government, I think our message is already quite clear -- that we don't like to be part of the Philippines anymore," Misuari said in his message last month, a copy of which was obtained by AFP.
He called on his forces to "surround and secure all military, police and all other installations, airports, seaports and all other vital government and private institutions".
The MNLF signed a peace deal in 1996, dropping its bid for independence and settling for autonomy, although its followers had not totally disarmed.
The government later said the agreement was a "failed experiment" with many areas remaining in deep poverty.
It is not the first time Misuari has attacked Zamboanga.
In 2001, he and his followers took dozens of hostages and left many more dead in Zamboanga and in nearby Jolo island, his home base.
The MNLF later freed all the hostages after several days, in exchange for free passage out of the city as Misuari fled to Malaysia, where he was arrested and deported.
He was held in a police camp near Manila until 2008, when the government dropped all charges against him.
Copyright © 2013 AFP. All rights reserved.
BBC News - Philippine rebels in deadly attack in Zamboanga
9 September 2013 Last updated at 05:53 ET Share this pageEmailPrint
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Philippine rebels in deadly attack in Zamboanga
Footage shows soldiers firing at rebels, and residents fleeing, as the BBC's South-East Asia correspondent Jonathan Head reports
Clashes between Philippine troops and hundreds of suspected Muslim rebels have left at least six people dead, officials say.
Suspected members of the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) moved in on Zamboanga, a city in Mindanao, by boat early on Monday, officials said.
Clashes spread from the coast to the city's busy Rio Hondo area.
The MNLF signed a peace agreement with the government in 1996. However, some of its fighters remain active.
Many residents have fled Rio Hondo to escape the fighting.
"The main target by the MNLF in encroaching Zamboanga city is to raise their banner of independence at city hall," city mayor, Isabelle Climaco-Salazar, told Agence-France Presse (AFP) news agency.
She told media that the clashes have killed at least two security personnel and four civilians.
There were also reports of a number of people who were wounded.
At least 20 residents were being held hostage, reports quoted the military and police as saying.
Armed forces spokesman, Lt Col Ramon Zagala, said that around 800 troops had been deployed to secure the city.
"We are trying to contain them, so that this will not spread elsewhere," he told Agence-France Presse news agency.
'Armed groups'
The incident follows a declaration of independence by the veteran MNLF leader Nur Misuari last month, after he complained that his faction had been frozen out of a peace agreement being negotiated between the government and a larger insurgent group, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), the BBC's Jonathan Head south east Asia correspondent reports.
Asamin Hussin, National Security Commander for the MNLF, told AP news agency that they wanted independence.
"We want to establish our own Bangsamoro government, not an autonomous government but we want an independent Mindanao as Bangsamoro nation," he said.
Bangsamoro refers to Muslim people in the southern Philippines.
Nur Misuari founded the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) in 1971, with the goal of fighting the Philippine state for an independent Islamic nation.
It signed a peace deal with the government in 1996, but continues to be involved in clashes in the southern Philippines.
Many factions have splintered from the MNLF, including the MILF.
The situation in the southern Philippines is complicated by the existence of dozens of different armed groups, some advocating Islamic states, other little more than gangs living off kidnapping, Jonathan Head reports.
BBC News - Philippine rebel attack in Zamboanga kills soldier
Philippine rebel attack in Zamboanga kills soldier
9 September 2013 Last updated at 02:57 ET Help
Clashes between Philippine troops and around 100 suspected Muslim rebels have killed one soldier and wounded at least six, officials say.
Suspected members of the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) moved in on Zamboanga, a city in Mindanao, by boat early on Monday, officials said.
Clashes spread from the coast to the city's busy Rio Hondo area.
The MNLF signed a peace agreement with the government in 1996. However, some of its fighters remain active.
The BBC's South-East Asia correspondent, Jonathan Head, says the rebels arrived for a "show of force".
Filipino rebels storm villages, take hostages
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