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By Al Jacinto, Correspondent
ZAMBOANGA CITY: Police here foiled an apparent
bombing attempt, finding an improvised explosive device (IED),
before it went off.
It was the third home-made bomb discovered by
the police in just 24 hours in this city on Friday.
No group or individual has claimed
responsibility for the failed bombing.
The IED was found near an electric cooperative,
which was previously targeted by the al-Qaeda-linked Abu Sayyaf
group, officials said.
“It was an IED alright, but we still do not
know what it was made from,” said Supt. Jose Bayani Gucela, a
police explosives expert.
The home-made bomb was left at a convenience
store near the Zamboanga City Electric Cooperative Inc., in the
village of Putik.
Police said the store owner, Peregrino Perez,
discovered the explosive device around 6 a.m. and informed
authorities about it.
“I knew it was a bomb because I saw a cell
phone and wires connected to the tin can, which probably contained
explosives. Police said the can weighs about two kilograms or
more,” Perez told reporters.
Policemen earlier recovered two home-made bombs
planted on a soft drink truck outside a factory near the village of
Culianan. The bombs, made from ammonium nitrate and wires, placed
inside two one-liter soft drink bottles, were discovered by the
truck’s driver during an inspection.
Ammonium nitrate, which is banned in the
Philippines, is commonly used as fertilizers. But rebels widely use
the chemical as an ingredient in the manufacture of home-made
explosives.
Authorities previously blamed the Moro Islamic
Liberation Front and the smaller Abu Sayyaf group in past bombings
in Zamboanga City. The two Muslim rebel forces were also linked to a
bombing outside a Philippine Air Force base in May in Zamboanga City
that killed three persons and wounded more than a dozen others.
Last year, more than a dozen persons were also
wounded in an ammonium nitrate bomb attack on a public square in
downtown Zamboanga City.
The Abu Sayyaf is listed by the US State
Department as a foreign terrorist organization, along with the New
People’s Army, armed wing of the Communist Party of the
Philippines.
Washington has sent hundreds of troops to the
City and Sulu province, both in southern Mindanao, to help the local
military defeat the Muslim extremist group, blamed for the spate of
bombings and kidnappings of Filipinos and foreigners in the region.
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