By Charlie Lagasca
ILAGAN CITY – Police
are readying multiple murder and frustrated murder charges against New People’s
Army rebels for the death of seven soldiers and wounding of nine others during
the Nov. 18 ambush in Barangay Mabbayad, Echague, Isabela.
Senior Supt. Franklin
Mabanag, Isabela police director, said among those to be charged are a certain
Ka MJ, spokesman of the NPA’s Benito Tesorio Command, which owned up to the
ambush, and Communist Party of the Philippines founder Jose Ma. Sison.
Mabanag said they are
also looking for evidence to link officials of the Mabuwaya Foundation, a
crocodile conservation foundation based in the Sierra Madre mountain range.
The group allegedly
harbored foreigners seen with the guerrillas before the ambush.
Marites Gatan-Balabas,
deputy director of the Mabuwaya Foundation, however, said they have nothing to
do with the foreigners seen with insurgents.
She said they have foreigners
doing crocodile research but not in the area where the encounter occurred.
The Isabela-based 5th
Infantry Division confirmed the presence of three female foreigners along with
some 30 NPA guerrillas, who were involved in the five-hour clash with soldiers.
“There are photographs
showing them with the lawless armed group,” said Col. Loreto Magundayao, chief
of the 5th ID’s civilian-military operations battalion.
Magundayao said
details about the foreigners’ identity, group and activities remain unavailable.
“We are still investigating why they were there,” he said.
“We will also be
filing charges against (these foreigners) if they are proven to have
participated in the firefight,” he added.
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