The Standard - 2016 February 4 - Thursday

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VOL. XXIX NO. 357 3 Sections 32 Pages P18 THURSday : FEBRUaRy 4, 2016 www.thestandard.com.ph editorial@thestandard.com.ph

Roxas confident Cebu will deliver

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PNP NAMES MILF MEN IN BOMBING By Francisco Tuyay

POLICE identified three suspects in Tuesday’s bomb attack in Tacurong City as being members of a faction of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front. The suspects were identified as Hairodin Abubakar, Lok Oteng and Daud Kansi, and were said to have had one other companion. Police said the improvised bomb was brought from Matanog, Maguindanao to Tacurong City

through Lambayong, Sultan Sa Barongis, Maguindanao. The military, on the other hand, said the blast, which injured several civilians, was the handiwork of Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters rebels.

The bomb held concrete nails and metal fragments and was concealed in the bumper of a black Toyota car parked at a vacant lot near the city center. Police and the military said they were tracking the assailants. The blast, one security expert said, could be a prelude to widescale hostilities between the MILF and security forces after the Bangsamoro Basic Law, the lynchpin for a peace agreement between the government and the rebels, failed

to pass in Congress. The rival Moro National Liberation Front said it would not be dragged into a shooting war with government forces. “We will not permit the war from spilling over to our areas,” MNLF spokesman Absalom Cerveza said amid signs that the MILF was preparing for war. Reports said the Tacurong bombing was a unilateral action by Abdullah Macapar, alias Commander Bravo of the MILF, who

was reportedly massing fighters in Central Mindanao following the collapse of the BBL. Cerveza said the prospects for peace in Mindanao depends on how the military handles the situation. “If the government will be stupid and go on a wanton assault, then widespread war could start,” Cerveza said. Earlier, chief government peace negotiator Miriam Coronel-Ferrer warned that failure to pass the BBL could spark violence. Next page

Girding for war. These are some of the soldiers belonging to five Army battalions and three Marine battalions deployed recently to Sulu province to go after an estimated 200 fighters of the Abu Sayyaf terror group. MARINES PHOTO

Comelec junks DQ complaints vs Duterte By John Paolo Bencito and Sara Susanne D. Fabunan HOURS before the Commission on Elections dismissed all disqualification cases against him, Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte lashed back at critics who didn’t believe he can end criminality in six months, saying they are bayot, the Cebuano term for gay.

“My enemies say, it’s impossible because they are gay,” Duterte said at a presidential forum at the University of the Philippines in Diliman Wednesday. Duterte’s critics in the administration—including administration standard bearer Manuel Roxas II and senatorial candidate and former Justice secretary Leila de Lima—have warned about the mayor’s brand of

frontier justice. “Killing is killing, no matter what… If he admitted he’s responsible for these killings, then he should be held criminally liable,” De Lima said of Duterte’s boasts about killing criminal suspects. Former human rights commissioner Loretta Rosales warned that voting for Duterte would bring back the MarNext page tial Law days.

Joint sea exercises with US planned

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