Three suspected members of a breakaway communist group and a policeman were killed in an encounter in Zambales province on Wednesday afternoon, the spokesman for the National Police said Thursday.
Chief Superintendent Agrimero Cruz Jr. said the firefight happened at Sitio San Isidro, Barangay Uacon in Candelaria town at about 5:30 p.m. Wednesday.
Members of the local police's Special Action Force were conducting security operations when they spotted the armed rebels, Cruz said.
An initial investigation showed that the rebels belonged to the Rebolusyonaryong Hukbong Bayan, a breakaway faction of the the Communist Party of the Philippines formed in 1998 and operating mainly in Central Luzon.
The US-based National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism describes the RHB as the armed wing of the Marxist-Leninist Party of the Philippines (MLPP).
Casualties
Killed in the assault was PO1 Joseph Raymundo who was rushed to the Candelaria District Hospital but declared dead on arrival.
After the clash subsided, government forces later recovered the remains of three of the armed rebels. The identities of the rebel fatalities were not immediately available.
Recovered from the site were three high-powered firearms - two M16 rifles and an M14 rifle.
Pursuit operations have since been launched against the rebels, Cruz said.
The firfight came on the heels of a series of clashes between government forces and communist rebels after the two-week truce between the government and the National Democratic Front ended on February 21.
Just last Sunday, three soldiers were killed while four others were wounded in Ifugao, also a northern Philippine province, in an attack by suspected NPA rebels.
On February 15, negotiators from both parties met in Norway to resume the long-stalled peace negotiations. It marked the first formal talks since negotiations bogged down August 2004.
source: gma
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