Manila: More than 100 people who were held hostage by Muslim rebels waging street battles with Philippine troops escaped yesterday amid a military offensive in which dozens of guerrillas were killed.
Ninety-nine people have died and 90,000 residents displaced since the stand-off in the southern city of Zamboanga began last week, when hundreds of Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) gunmen invaded in a bid to derail peace talks.
Hundreds of other civilians had remained trapped as the rebels sought shelter from a military assault in Muslim neighbourhoods of the city, with some of the residents used as hostages or human shields.
After a relentless military offensive involving helicopter rocket attacks and intense street fighting, 149 people escaped on Monday night and yesterday morning from the MNLF, authorities said.
The men, women and children were tearfully reunited with their relatives.
“I couldn’t sleep, I couldn’t eat, all I thought about was my little boy and my family,” a 28-year-old hotel employee said as he and his rescued family members hug each other. “My son, my father and mother, cousins and nephews were taken hostage... it was too much to bear.”
The man, who did not want his name published for security reasons, left Zamboanga three months ago with his wife to work in the United States but returned when they learnt their relatives had been taken hostage.
Aquino in war-torn city
Meanwhile, President Benigno Aquino remained in Zamboanga City to oversee the joint military-police operation there. He flew to the war-torn city last Friday.
Interior and Local Government Secretary Manuel Roxas, who has remained in Zamboanga since last Tuesday, said that government forces are “now in control of 70 per cent” of the formerly MNLF-occupied coastal villages.
Up to now, police and military operations are still focused on regaining Sta. Barbara and Kasanyangan villages, Brig. Gen. Domingo Tutaan said, adding that about 3,000 elite ground troops are battling MNLF rebel holdouts in the two villages and undertaking clearing operations in areas that were regained last Monday.
Two MG 520 attack helicopters that unleashed two rounds of rockets and gave support to ground troops on Monday, never aimed at residential areas, but at MNLF controlled and abandoned areas as well, Tutaan said, when asked if the government’s air strike had inflicted collateral damage on civilians.
About 145 of an estimated 200 hostages who were held earlier by MNLF rebels in six coastal villages were freed or had escaped, Tutaan said, adding that they underwent debriefing sessions at Camp Batalla of the Philippine National Police.
— With inputs from AFP
