MARAWI CITY, Philippines:The Philippine military urged Daesh-linked militants occupying a southern city to turn themselves in on Tuesday, the eighth day of a push by security forces using armored vehicles and firing rockets from helicopters to eliminate the gunmen.
The government says it is close to retaking Marawi from the Daesh-inspired Maute group, which seized parts of the city after a failed attempt by security forces to capture Isnilon Hapilon, the militants' so-called head of Southeast Asia.
"We call on the remaining terrorists to surrender while there is an opportunity," a military spokesman, Brigadier-General Restituto Padilla, told reporters.
As helicopters circled the lakeside city where smoke billowed out of some buildings, troops cleared rebel positions amid explosions and automatic gunfire, moving house by house and street by street.
More than 100 people have been killed, most of them militants, according to the military, and most of the city's residents have fled.
A Catholic priest held captive by the militants with a dozen other civilians appealed to President Rodrigo Duterte to consider their plight and stop the military operation.
Father Teresito "Chito" Soganub, vicar general of Marawi City, and the others were abducted in a cathedral last week.
"We are asking your help to please give what your enemies are asking for," the priest said on a video clip shown on a Telegram channel used by Daesh.
"We still want to live for another day, a month and a few years, please consider us, Mr President," he said.
A politician involved in efforts to evacuate residents, Zia Alonto Adiong, said authorities had cleared 85 percent of the city but reclaiming the rest would be a challenge because they were dense urban areas with trapped civilians.
"There's an intensifying military operation that's going on," Adiong told a media briefing.
Though most people have left, thousands are stranded, worried they could be intercepted by militants if they tried to flee.
'LIVE ANOTHER DAY'
Martin Thalmann, deputy head of delegation of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), said he tried, but failed to convince Daesh-affiliated insurgents and government forces to halt the violence so it can deliver aid.
"It's so intense, it's not possible," Thalmann told reporters, referring to the fighting.
"There's still a lot of people in there and of course it's a concern that they suffer under this shelling and we wonder if all the precautions are taken."
Air strikes were aimed at "specific targets of resistance to protect our troops and hasten clearing of the city", Padilla said, adding that "collateral damage" was being prevented.
Nearly 85,000 displaced people are staying in 38 shelter areas outside Marawi.
Leaders of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, a separatist group that has been in talks with the government, said they had agreed to help distribute aid after they met the president for talks.
Duterte had appealed on the weekend to rebel forces to become "soldiers of the republic" and unite to defeat the hardline Maute and allied Abu Sayyaf groups.
The Maute's ability to fight for so long will add to fears that Daesh ideology is spreading in the southern Philippines and it could become a haven for militants from Southeast Asia and beyond.
Malaysians and Indonesians were among the rebels killed.
The government believes the Maute carried out their assault before the Muslim holy month of Ramadan to capture the attention of Daesh and earn recognition as a regional affiliate.
WEEK-LONG ASSAULT
A week-long assault by militant rebels in this southern Philippine city is being fueled with stolen weapons and ammunition and fighters broken out of jails, the military said on Wednesday, as troops battled militants resisting ground and air attacks.
The pro-Daesh Maute group has proven to be a fierce enemy, clinging on to the heart of Marawi City through days of air strikes on what the military called known rebel targets, defying expectations of a swift end to their occupation.
The military on Wednesday deployed for the first time SF-260 close air support planes to back attack helicopters and ground troops looking to box rebels into a downtown area.
The rebels hold about a tenth of the city, the army said.
Military spokesman Restituto Padilla said the hardline Maute had kept up the fight with rifles and ammunition stolen from a police station, a prison, and an armored police vehicle.
"They were able to get an armored vehicle of the police," Padilla added. "Inside, there is a supply of bullets," he said, adding that the ammunition was among the stolen items the rebels were using to resist the forces being poured into the area.
The militants, who freed jailed comrades to join the battle, opted for urban warfare because arms were available in the city and homes and shops provided ample supplies of food, Padilla said.
"Yes indeed, there was planning involved," he added.
The military has from the outset insisted it has control of the situation, but the slow pace of efforts to retake Marawi has prompted questions about its strategy.
That has been compounded by social media images of smiling fighters with assault rifles posing on an armored, US-made police combat vehicle, dressed in black and wearing headbands typical of Daesh.
Another picture showed a bearded man at the wheel of a police van flying a Daesh, the so-called Islamic State, flag. The authenticity of the images has not been independently verified and the military has urged the public not to spread "propaganda".
ALARMING RISE
The Philippine government has been alarmed by the strength of the Maute and intelligence reports suggesting it has teamed up with other extremist groups and has recruited foreign fighters.
President Rodrigo Duterte has declared martial law on Mindanao island where Marawi is located, in a move to crush a movement he is now calling a Daesh invasion.
The military believe the Maute and its associates staged the Marawi takeover to try to win Daesh's endorsement as its affiliate in Southeast Asia.
Eighty-nine militants, 21 security forces and 19 civilians were killed in the unrest, which security experts say is a sign extremists in the southern Philippines are now better organized and funded, pointing to the Maute's rapid rise from obscurity.
In back-channel talks with the militants, the remaining fighters had been urged to give up, Padilla said.
"We are appealing to these armed men to come to their senses, lay down their weapons and surrender," he said.
The government on Wednesday said one Mindanao separatist group, which had struck a yet-to-be-implemented peace deal with it, had agreed to help the military get civilians, dead or alive, out of Marawi.
The Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) has accepted Duterte's unconventional offer for communist and separatist rebel groups to unite to stop the spread of radical Islam in the southern Philippines.
Congress held a special hearing on martial law, which minority bloc lawmakers called an overreaction by Duterte, made during an overseas trip, and without consulting security agencies.
His decision has broad support in the legislature, with some backers urging tough measures to defeat the enemy.
"With the military is now admitting ISIS (Daesh) is in the Philippines we have a serious problem," said congressman Harry Roque, who filed a resolution supporting martial law.
"ISIS is not a small problem, it is a very big problem."
