By EDWIN IYO
Correspondent
and FROILAN GALLARDO
Special Correspondent

GINGOOG City--Rebel and government forces exchanged firepower at least twice this week in eastern Misamis Oriental, days after the commander of the Army’s 4th Infantry Division asserted that the military has significantly weakened the New People’s Army in the region.

Some 15 rebels clashed with soldiers in  Sitio Minlagas, Barangay San Luis, this city, yesterday morning, two days after a fierce armed encounter in an outlying village in Lagonglong town.

Lt. Jefferson Mariano, 58th Infantry Batallion spokesman, said troops from the Alpha Company of the battalion were clearing an area in Minlagas when they chanced on a group of heavily armed rebels.

Mariano said soldiers and rebels fought for about 15 minutes before the NPA guerrillas withdrew towards the southwest direction.

Mariano said soldiers were sent to the area because the military received intelligence information that rebels were sighted in the place.

Soldiers found NPA belongings left behind by the withdrawing rebels: six backpacks, two portable solar panels, medical paraphernalia and documents.

Mariano said pursuit operations were ongoing. He said troops from the 65th Infantry Battalion have been sent as augmentation and blocking forces.

On Tuesday, soldiers engaged communist rebels in a 30-minute firefight on top of a dormant volcano in eastern Misamis Oriental.

Lt. Col. Roy Derilo, commander of the Army 58th Infantry Battalion, said a rebel was killed and several firearms were seized during the encounter on top of the 1,245-meter high Mt. Obulan in Barangay Banglay, Lagonglong town.

Derilo said the body of the rebel was turned over to the officials of Lagonglong town for a decent burial.

He said one of the soldiers was slightly wounded when a bullet grazed his right arm.

Derilo said the soldiers found two M653 rifles, a M16 rifle, a AK47 assault rifle, a Garand rifle, a caliber 22 rifle, and assorted ammunition.

“Our soldiers have been tracking these rebels; they had a brief encounter three days ago,” Derilo said.

On Tuesday afternoon, Derilo said a 10-person Army team managed to sneak near the camp where the rebels had run to Mt. Obulan, a dormant volcano.

Derilo said the Army team leader told him they called out to the rebels to lay down their firearms since they were surrounded.

He said the rebels fired at the soldiers instead of surrendering.

“My team leader told me he saw the rebels jump into a nearby ravine while firing their firearms,” Derilo said.

Lt. Col. Ezra Balagtey, spokesperson of the AFP Eastern Mindanao Command, said a total of 395 firearms of various calibers were taken from the rebels from Jan. 1 to Dec. 10,  this year.

Balagtey said another 750 firearms were surrendered during the same period.

Maj. Gen. Franco Nemesio Gacal, chief of the Army’s 4th Infantry Division, earlier said Army forces have sharply reduced the strength of the communist New People’s Army with five thousand of its fighters and supporters surrendering since January.