Six killed in encounters in Maguindanao, Basilan

Policemen and soldiers on Saturday, May 10, arrested seven from an armed group that figured in gunfights with a rival partisan faction in Pandag, Maguindanao del Sur that left a candidate for municipal councilor and a student dead.

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The seven gunmen and their companions first traded shots with personnel of units under the Maguindanao del Sur Provincial Police Office and the Army's 2nd Mechanized Infantry Battalion who responded to the incident before they yielded when they noticed that they had been surrounded and could be killed if they resisted arrest.

Moro community leaders had told reporters on Sunday, May 11, that the companions of the seven gunmen, now locked in a police detention facility, had escaped towards another barangay, bringing with them their military-type combat weapons.

Officials of the Pandag Municipal Police Station and the Maguindanao Provincial Police Office confirmed to reporters on Sunday that two villagers, Emran Tumbah Mamalinta, a candidate for municipal councilor in Pandag, and a male student, Alkama Kilam Maslama, got killed in the crossfire between the two groups, each identified with feuding local politicians locked in a deep-seated political rivalry.