3 soldiers, civilian slain in Lanao Norte terror attack

LANAO DEL NORTE --- Maute terrorists killed three unarmed soldiers on a marketing mission and a civilian in an attack at Poona Piagapo town on Thursday morning.

The fatalities, Corporals Albert Saura and Bryan Binayog and Private 1^st Class Albert Soriano and an owner of a motorcycle-for-hire named Camilo Andog, died on the spot from bullet wounds.

The slain soldiers belonged to the 43^rd Company of the 4^th Mechanized Battalion under the Philippine Army’s 2^nd Mechanized Infantry Brigade covering a number of towns in Lanao del Norte. 

Col. Isaias Bacurnay, officer-in-charge of the Lanao del Norte provincial police office, said Friday the three soldiers, together riding the rented motorcycle of Tandog, were on their way to the public market in Baloi town when they were attacked. 

Bacurnay, who led a team that responded to the scene, said local officials are certain the culprits are members of the Dawlah Islamiya terror bloc, more known as the “Maute group” that still has remnants in the adjoining provinces of Lanao del Norte and Lanao del Sur and its capital, Marawi City.

The ambushers also opened fire at an approaching gray Toyota Hilux bearing license plates VEZ 604 as they scampered away, wounding its owner, Amen Sumagumba, an ethnic Maranao. 

Lt. Gen. Corleto Vinluan of the Western Mindanao Command said Friday the bloody incident at about 9:00 a.m. Thursday in Poona Piagapo was meant to create the impression that the Dawlah Islamiya is still capable of terror attacks following the fall of many of its enclaves in Lanao del Sur and the surrender of no fewer than a 60 members since 2018.  

Maute terrorists executed last December using a powerful improvised explosive device four Visayan men --- Leo Baloro, Nito Bacayan, Lito Angcap and Francis Alcaba --- in a forest in Madalum, Lanao del Sur. 

Key sources from the Lanao del Sur provincial police and the Army’s 103^rd Brigade in Marawi City said the victims were abducted by gunmen while hunting for wild pigs at Sitio Bangko in Barangay Tongan-Tongan in Madalum, herded at one spot and killed with an IED detonated from a distance using a mobile phone.