Another off-duty soldier killed in Dawlah Islamiya attack
Mindanao Armed Conflict • 10:30 AM Tue Jun 9, 2020
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By:
John M. Unson
MAGUINDANAO --- Suspected Dawlah Islamiya hitmen killed another off duty soldier Monday, the group’s 36th unarmed military victim in central Mindanao since 2016.
The fatality, Staff Sgt. Bien Zamora Mendoza, belonged to the 61st Reconnaissance Company of the 6th Infantry Division.
Two men on a motorcycle armed with pistols attacked him from behind while he was motoring through a stretch of a highway in Simuay area in Sultan Kudarat, Maguindanao while en route to the headquarters of 6th ID in Camp Siongco near Cotabato City.
Mendoza went home Saturday to Pigcawayan, about 22 kilometers away from Camp Siongco, on a weekend pass from his unit.
A number of off-duty motorcycle-riding soldiers, mostly out on weekend passes, were killed in a spate of attacks in Sultan Kudarat town in the past three years.
Key members of different municipal peace and order councils in Maguindanao province have been pointing to the Dawlah Islamiya as responsible for the killings in central Mindanao of off-duty soldiers in one attack after another since 2016.
The Dawlah Islamiya is also known as the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters operating in the fashion of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria.
At least 36 off-duty soldiers have been killed by Dawlah Islamiya hitmen in central Mindanao in the past four years.