Plot to bomb Cotabato lodging houses foiled

By John Unson

The Philippine Star, Friday, April 29, 2011

COTABATO CITY, Philippines – Members of the Marine Battalion Landing Team 7 (MBLT-7) and the local police foiled on Wednesday night a plot by suspected extremists to bomb lodging houses in this city.

Lt. Col. Dorotheo Jose Jalandoni, commanding officer of MBLT-7, said policemen and Marines, acting on information from barangay officials, found the improvised explosives after an extensive search using bomb-sniffing dogs in one of the rooms of the N.D. Avenue Lodging House.

Authorities said the bombs were apparently hidden there as part of a bigger plot to bomb two lodging houses in the city’s main commercial district.

Jalandoni said the improvised explosives, fashioned from an 81-mm and two 60-mm mortar projectiles rigged with trip wire, were immediately detonated outside the lodging house.

Jalandoni said two handguns were also found in a bag in the same room at N.D. Avenue Lodging House.

Police intelligence sources said they have been receiving persistent but unverified reports that the group behind the bombing plot is composed of newly trained followers of foreign-trained bomber Basit Usman.

Usman was tagged as the mastermind in more than a dozen bombings in public places and buses in Central Mindanao from 2003 to 2009.

Usman, an ethnic Maguindanaon, was said to have undergone training in handling and fabrication of explosives in Kandahar, Afghanistan and Peshawar, Pakistan in the 1990s. – With Roel Pareño, Jaime Laude

Philstar.com

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More Marines fielded in Cotabato

By: John Unson

The Philippine Star, Friday, 12 November 2010

COTABATO CITY – Four more companies of Marines arrived yesterday to help the local police fight kidnappers and extortionists whose attacks in recent months have stifled the city’s economy.

The Marines, who belong to the Marine Battalion Landing Team 7 (MBLT-7), were personally endorsed to Cotabato City Mayor Japal Guiani Jr. by Commodore Philip Lacayan, commander of the Naval Forces in Eastern Mindanao, during simple rites at the Polloc port in Parang, Maguindanao.

The Marines were brought by a Navy boat from Basilan, where they spent almost four years of peacekeeping missions.

“We ought to thank President Aquino for having listened to the clamors of residents of Cotabato City, including the business and religious communities, for him to send the Marines,” Guiani said.

The MBLT-7 members are taking over all security installations here of the Army’s anti-crime Task Force Tugis, an erstwhile unit of the Army’s 6th Infantry Division based in Datu Odin, Maguindanao.

Task Force Tugis was disbanded last month and re-organized into a new humanitarian group dubbed Task Force Bigkis Lahi.

More Marines deployed in Cotabato

By: PNA

Daily Tribune, Friday, 12 November 2010

POLLOC PORT, Maguindanao — Fresh from their stint in Basilan, some 300 additional troops from the 7th Marine Battalion Landing Team (MBLT) arrived here yesterday to boost efforts on restoring peace and order in Cotabato City following a spate of kidnapping and bombing incidents targeting against the local business sector.

“We are here upon the request of Cotabato City officials and business leaders,” Marine Forces Eastern Mindanao Commander Philip Cacayan told newsmen here during a welcome ceremony conducted by the city government.

The additional Marine force forms part of a small contingent, comprising some 50 Marine personnel, sent earlier this month to immediately address the rising criminality in the city.

Prior to their arrival, two kidnappings and four bombings occurred, respectively, in a span of three months in the area.

Cacayan said the 7th MBLT will not focus mainly in Cotabato City but also parts of nearby Maguindanao and Sultan Kudarat provinces where intermittent fighting between armed factions of influential clans were reported.

“Actually, another 300 Marine troopers would be deployed in the coastal areas of Kalamansig and Lebak in Sultan Kudarat and Datu Blah Sinsuat in Maguindanao,” the Marine official said.

“Our order is to stay in the areas concerned as long as our presence is needed,” he stressed. PNA

During the Marines’ first deployment here in the mid-90s, crime significantly decreased, including kidnappings and bombings, due to a series of arrests made by Marines against outlaws.

Sometime in 2002 after a change in the national leadership, the Marines were pulled out from Cotabato and reassigned to hostile parts in Basilan, Sulu and Lamitan.

“Now that they are back, Cotabatenos are somehow relieved of their fears from criminal activities that have hounded the city for several years,” Cotabato City Mayor Japal Guiani Jr. said.

The mayor, who led in welcoming the Marine contingent, pointed out that the soldiers could also help much on instilling “discipline” among Cotabatenos, particularly the youth.

“The Marines as an elite fighting force has the reputation of valueing discipline and this can be instilled on the minds of the young Cotabatenos who are exposed on illegal acts such as gang wars, drugs and gamblings, among other vices,” he said.

The 7th MBLT was based temporarily in Pedro Colina Hill, a military reservation area in Cotabato, where the undermanned local police force, comprising of 150 cops and personnel, is also holding office.

Cotabato City has a population of over 200,000 Christian and Muslim settlers.