[BenarNews] Seven button men with suspected links to Abu Sayyaf
...also known as al-Harakat al-Islamiyya, an Islamist terror group based in Jolo, Basilan and Zamboanga. Since its inception in the early 1990s, the group has carried out bombings, kidnappings, murders, head choppings, and extortion in their uniquely Islamic attempt to set up an independent Moslem province in the Philippines. Abu Sayyaf forces probably number less than 300 cadres. The group is closely allied with remnants of Indonesia's Jemaah Islamiya and has loose ties with MILF and MNLF who sometimes provide cannon fodder...
faceless myrmidons were slain over the weekend by police hunting for a group leader wanted in connection with the 2009 killing of a police superintendent in the southern Philippines, officials said.
The shootout in the Sulu Islands took place on Sunday, a day after a pro-Islamic State
 ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that they were al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're really very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear western pols talk they're not really Moslems....
bully boy group ambushed a Marine patrol, leaving one of the troops dead and wounding three others in Lanao del Sur, another province in the volatile south.
In Sulu province, police launched a pre-dawn operation to arrest Juko Dahim, whose group had worked with Abu Sayyaf Group snuffies in several operations, officials said. He was wanted for his alleged role in the ambush killing of Senior Superintendent Jularisim Kasim, the provincial police chief, 14 years ago.
"However,
a clean conscience makes a soft pillow...
the heavily gang of Alganer Dahim and Juko Dahim sensed the arrival of the operating units, triggering the firefight," said Richard Verceles, operations chief of the Area Police Command for Western Mindanao.
Members of the Sulu field unit of the police’s Criminal Investigation and Detection Group, police commandos and other units were involved in Sunday’s operation.
Verceles said seven bully boys, including Juko Dahim, were killed in the 40-minute firefight. Two suspects were arrested and several high-powered assault rifles, ammunition and other war materials were recovered. A junior officer and two civilians were maimed as well.
Alganer Dahim escaped and is the subject of a manhunt, police said.
According to police, Juko Dahim and his group were members and supporters of dead Abu Sayyaf kidnap-for-ransom sub-leader Majan Sahidjuan (alias Apo Mike), whose group was blamed for cross-border kidnappings in Sabah, a state in nearby Malaysian Borneo.
Verceles said Juko was involved in kidnapping activities and armed encounters with government forces, killing civilians and illegal drug trade.
SATURDAY ATTACK
A day earlier, suspected Maute-Daulah Islamiyah faceless myrmidons launched a bushwhack of the Marine patrol in Marogong, a town in Lanao del Sur. The Maute group is one of many factions of Daulah Islamiyah, the local name for the Islamic State bad boy group.
"The Marines were not in uniform and were just bringing their short firearms because they were conducting community relations in the village," Lt. Col. Sergio Reyes Ronquillo, commander of the 2nd Marine Battalion Landing Team, told news hounds.
Ronquillo said Marine Sgt. Tonti Melbert Pamaran, who was leading the patrol, was killed instantly. Despite their injuries, the three maimed Marines fought the faceless myrmidons until reinforcements from a nearby camp arrived.
Previously, Philippine Army Chief Lt. Gen. Romeo Brawner had said that the Daulah Islamiyah faceless myrmidons were losing strength after government troops attacked their camp in Maguing, Lanao del Sur, last March.
He said the faceless myrmidons numbered about 25 and were led by Faharudin Hadji Satar (also known as Abu Bakar or Abu Zacaria). 
|
