4 killed, 8 cops injured in clash with MILF members

LANAO DEL SUR, Philippines — Four were killed, three of them members of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, while eight police officers were wounded in encounters Thursday in Madamba, Lanao del Sur.

A police team with arrest warrants for murder suspects Usop Malubay, Abomay Abdulazis, Zainodin Macalantas Ameril, Macabuntal Alican and Usman Barating figured in a firefight in Barangay Ilian when the suspects resisted.

The separate warrants for their arrest were issued by Regional Trial Court Branch 10 in Marawi City.

The Regional Police Office-Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao confirmed on Friday the deaths of Abdulazis, Ameril and Alican, whom they said were armed with rifles, in the initial encounter.

The fourth fatality, a certain Casara Macalantas, was not a subject of the law enforcement operation carried out by combined personnel of the Lanao del Sur provincial police and operatives from elite PRO-BARMM units.

Von Al-Haq, spokesman of the MILF's Bangsamoro Islamic Armed Forces, on Friday confirmed that the scene of the encounter is inside an MILF camp covered by a ceasefire agreement with the national government.

Al-Haq said Abdulazis, Ameril and Alican were MILF members under Commander Abu Haniff, who is in their roster of field commanders in Lanao del Sur.

The MILF has dispatched a team to Madamba to determine if the police operation was initiated according to security protocols indicated in its ceasefire pact with Malacañang.

"We learned that there was no prior coordination so there was this encounter," Al-Haq told reporters on Friday morning.

Police Brig. Gen. Graciano Mijares, director of PRO-BARMM, said the raiding team recovered from the slain MILF members four M16 assault rifles, one fitted with a 40-mm grenade launcher.

“Our men brought with them arrest warrants issued by a court,” Mijares said.

Police Col. Madzgani Mukaram, director of the Lanao del Sur provincial police, said the team that carried out the operation was attacked by relatives of the slain suspects while moving out from Barangay Ilian, a secluded area in Madamba.

Mukaram said eight of his police officers were wounded in the running firefight.

Reports reaching the headquarters of PRO-BARMM in Parang town in Maguindanao stated that the gunmen also shot with shoulder-fire grenades a police patrol vehicle its passengers abandoned as they maneuvered away while under fire.

"The patrol vehicle got burned and has not been pulled out from there yet," Mukaram said.

Mukaram said two villagers trapped in the crossfire, Rohaida Padilla and a child named Adzis Amladin, sustained gunshot wounds in different parts of their bodies.

Police Corporal Gilbert Males, reported as captured by MILF guerrillas as the skirmish ensued, informed his superiors via mobile on Thursday night that he has retreated safely and would wait for fellow police officers