Philippine military launches new air raids in Marawi battle

Philippine soldiers adjust the barrel of their 50mm machine gun atop their armored vehicle in Marawi on Friday. (AFP)

MARAWI: Loud explosions rang out in the now mostly deserted city of Marawi on Friday as Philippine fighter jets launched fresh bombing runs in a bid to dislodge militants linked to Daesh.
Buildings burned after the raids, as ground forces shelled fortifications and tunnels in the eastern half of the mainly Muslim city, where up to 50 fighters are believed to be holed up.
The death toll from the 11-day-old conflict in Marawi reached 175 as the military reported four fresh fatalities among its forces.
The toll includes 11 soldiers who were killed in friendly fire this week during a mis-targeted airstrike.
A total of 120 militant gunmen have been killed, including suspected foreign fighters, while the battles have also left at least 19 civilians dead.
Around 2,000 people remained trapped by the fighting, some of them being used by the militants as human shields, the military said.
The militants have also kidnapped a Catholic priest and 14 other people, whose fates are unknown. They have threatened to kill the hostages unless government forces pull back.
The Philippine government has rejected the demand.
Clashes erupted in Marawi, a city of 200,000 people, when security forces raided a house to arrest Isnilon Hapilon, a veteran Filipino militant regarded as Daesh’s leader in the Philippines.
Authorities said they were taken by surprise when many gunmen emerged to protect Hapilon and then went on a rampage through Marawi.
Shortly after the violence erupted President Rodrigo Duterte imposed martial law across the southern region of Mindanao, home to 20 million people, to quell what he said was a Daesh bid to establish a base in the mainly Catholic Philippines.
Lt. Col. Jo-Ar Herrera, spokesman for the government forces fighting them in Marawi, said Hapilon remained in the area. “He is in charge of the (gunmen), he’s commanding them,” Herrera said.
Another army spokesman said the general leading the offensive in Marawi had been relieved of his command,
The removal of Brig. Gen. Nixon Fortes as commander of the army brigade in Marawi City and his replacement by his deputy, Col. Generoso Ponio, was not related to the battle that has raged in the city, the spokesman said.
“That’s not the reason,” spokesman Lt Col. Ray Tiongson said when asked if Fortes’ replacement was triggered by the course of the conflict.
Fortes was appointed commander of the army’s 103rd Brigade in January and oversaw a series of operations on the island of Mindanao to disrupt the militants.
A military source said Fortes was dismissed because not all his forces were in the city when the rebels began their rampage, even though military intelligence had indicated that militants, including foreign fighters, were amassing there.
The source said that some of Fortes’ forces were busy fighting a small band of communist insurgents in a nearby town when some 400 militants overran Marawi City on May 23 after a botched military raid to capture Hapilon.
On Friday, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) raised the problem of decomposing bodies with the provincial government, noting only 19 bodies of the dead had been recovered since the conflict began.
“There are a lot of dogs hunting around town. They are starving. They are eating the bodies,” said Roberto Petronio, head of the ICRC’s Mindanao sub-delegation.
“We warned the authorities that there is a risk of an outbreak of rabies.”
Military officials said operations were slow because militants had taken civilians as hostages, using women and children as human shields in fortified commercial buildings in the city center.
They said that militant snipers on top of buildings have complicated the use of ground troops and forced the military to rely on air power.
In another part of insurgency-plagued Mindanao, President Duterte told soldiers he had received a letter from a negotiator for a Maoist-led guerrilla group offering “fight alongside with us against terrorism.”
“Maybe, they realized if Daesh will prevail in Mindanao or even part of Mindanao, they will be not part of any new government,” he said.
Communist rebel leaders issued a statement on Thursday, urging the government to return to a fifth round of negotiations in the Netherlands, saying they also opposed militants who did not respect human rights.