ZAMBOANGA CITY, Philippines, June 20 -- The Philippine military reports (Friday) Muslim rebels fired rockets and automatic weapons at troops near their Buldon stronghold, leaving a soldier and several guerillas dead. Capt. Salih Indanan, army spokesman, said militiamen recovered the body of a Moro Islamic Liberation Front fighter, an M16 rifle and 150 rounds of ammunition after the two-day attack starting Thursday was rebuffed. 'Many dead rebels were taken by their comrades fleeing into the hinterlands,' Indanan said, adding troops were scouring jungle lairs for the 80 heavily-armed men who launched the skirmish. Indanan said government troops retaliated with heavy artillery and shelled several MILF positions in the southern Philippine town in Maguindanao province. In a separate encounter, rebels belonging to the Abu Sayyaf extremist faction sent rockets into a small village in the provincial capital of Isabela, seriously wounding at least two soldiers. The fighting erupted after government and MILF negotiators failed to reach an agreement on a general ceasefire after two days of talks ending Wednesday. Although a local ceasefire for Buldon was agreed to in January, it has been repeatedly broken with each side blaming the other. The military has accused the MILF of being involved in a rash of kidnappings, charges that are denied by MILF chief negotiator Ghazali Jaafar. The MILF has been infuriated over the ongoing military presence in Buldon, particularly after 10 students and their teacher were killed in a shelling in March. The government wants to sign a peace treaty with the 10,000-member MILF to end 25 years of Islamic rebellion and banditry in the main island of Mindanao, homeland of the more than 7 million Muslims in Asia's only Catholic country.
The government signed an accord with the Moro National Liberation Front, the largest Islamic group, in September, but dissatisfaction has prompted many defections. ---NEWLN:Copyright 1997 by United Press InternationalNEWLN:All Rights ReservedNEWLN:---
