5 Dawlah gunmen neutralized in South Cotabato
Mindanao Armed Conflict • 13:00 PM Fri Nov 13, 2020
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By:
John M. Unson
The slain suspected terrorist in Polomolok, South Cotabato. (South Cotabato PNP photos)
SOUTH COTABATO ---- Army special forces operatives killed five Dawlah Islamiya gunmen in a gunfight in Polomolok town on Friday morning.
One of the fatalities is Arafat Bulacon, a senior leader of the Ansar al-Khilafa Philippines, a dominant subgroup in the outlawed Dawlah Islamiya.
The Dawlah Islamiya operates in the fashion of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria and is blamed for all deadly bombings in central Mindanao since 2014.
Major Gen. Juvymax Uy of the Army’s 6th Infantry Division said the five terrorists perished in an encounter with combined personnel of the 5th Special Forces Battalion and the 4th Special Action Battalion in Barangay Koronadal Proper in Polomolok, South Cotabato.
The soldiers dispatched to check on the reported presence in Purok 6 in Barangay Koronadal Proper of Bulacon and his four followers were forced to neutralize them when they opened fire, provoking a gunfight.
Uy said soldiers found beside the cadavers of the slain terrorists an M4 assault rifle, handguns, an improvised explosive device and an ISIS flag.
Bulacon is one of the alleged plotters of a deadly bomb attack in 2018 in nearby General Santos City.