Monday, June 11, 2007 Army's main bomb division moved to Central Mindanao By Ben O. Tesiorna
THE Philippine Army has confirmed the transfer of the main bulk of its Explosive and Ordnance Division (EOD) team from Fort Bonifacio to Central Mindanao after a series of bombing incidents happened in the area the past months.
The transfer was reported in MILF's website, www. luwaran.com, where it said Army chief Lt. Gen. Romeo Tolentino said the decision to transfer was reached after terrorist threats in Central Mindanao was observed to be on the rise.
“We transferred the battalion headquarters of our EOD in Central Mindanao because the problem of the bombings is always in Central Mindanao so the headquarters should be there to address these incidents in the area,” Tolentino was quoted as saying in the website report.
This was confirmed by Major Randolph Cabangbang, spokesperson of the Eastern Mindanao Command.
The Army's EOD Battalion composed of about 100 bomb and explosive experts under the command of Lt. Col. Mariano Antonio is now based at the 6th Infantry Division in Awang, Maguindanao.
The Army said with the EOD's main headquarters nearer, bomb and explosive experts would lessen the response time of the military to any bomb threats.
Tolentino was said to have admitted that the terror alert level in the region remains “extreme-severe.”
“Extreme” is the highest in the National Intelligence Council (NIC)'s four alert-levels in its appreciation and assessment on threats of terror in the country.
Despite the proximity of the Filipino bomb experts though, two agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation were reportedly helping in the investigation on the latest bomb explosion in Matalam, North Cotabato last week.
Local police authorities said the participation of the two US agents could help establish if the regional terror group Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) was behind the explosion that wounded 10 people.
The US bomb experts are said to be participants in the ongoing military exercise in Carmen, North Cotabato.
Only on June 1, the US Embassy in Manila issued an advisory warning Americans of possible bomb attacks in bus terminals and public markets in Kidapawan and Makilala in North Cotabato.
An earlier angle pursued by the authorities is that Friday's explosion inside the Weena bus could be the handiwork of extortionists.
They are however not discounting the possibility that it could also be perpetrated by terrorists.
The explosive was reportedly fashioned out of a mortar shell fitted with a triggering device connected to a mobile phone, similar to the ones used in previous bomb attacks in other parts of Central Mindanao.
In those attacks, including that in Makilala that killed six people last year, authorities identified Moro guerrillas linked to the JI as the perpetrators.
