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Among the dead were soldiers and civilians. The explosions occurred in a city square and near a cathedral attacked by a suicide bombing last year.
By Jason Gutierrez
MANILA – Two heavy explosions ravaged densely populated offs of an island in the southern Philippines on Monday, killing at least 11 other people and injuring 43 others in a well-known stronghold of the extremist group Abu Sayyaf.
“There was a strong explosion” around noon near the town square on Jolo Island, said Captain Rex Payot, spokesman for the joint police and military task force against terrorism.
Reports from the police and army indicated that infantry and civilian soldiers were immediately killed in the first explosion, which occurred while an army workers’ corps was helping the local municipal government exhaust Covid-19’s humanitarian efforts.
Soon after, a momentary explosion struck near the Notre Dame cathedral on Mount Carmel. Earlier last year, a suicide bomber in the same cathedral killed at least 23 other people as the faithful piled up for Sunday Mass.
Mayor Kherkar Tan de Jolo said that in total at least six soldiers, one policeman and four civilians were killed in Monday’s explosions. At least 18 soldiers, six officials and 19 civilians were also wounded.
No one took charge without delay of the explosions. But Jolo, in the Sulu archipelago in the far south of the country, has long been a busy territory and a hotbed of militant activities.
Abu Sayyaf, who has pledged allegiance to the Islamic State organization, has split into several factions, one of which is led by Hatib Hajan Sawadjaan, the identified leader of the Islamic State organization in the southern Philippines. Sawadjaa claimed his duty for the Notre-Dame du Mont Carmel suicide bombing last year.
Mindanao’s Western Military Command said in an internal report noted through the New York Times that the first explosion occurred outdoors in the Food Plaza paradise in a town called The Walled City in downtown Jolo. An initial investigation was known to him as an improvised explosive device attached to a motorcycle. The explosion destroyed two army vehicles.
“Based on the first discoveries, a burnt motorcycle was noticed in the area,” the army said. “This may be the vehicle used by the suspect.”
General Manuel Abu, police leader of Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in the Mindanao Muslim region, which includes Jolo, said the first explosion probably intended to lure the government into the area.
“The moment the explosion occurred in the face of the first explosion,” he said. “Initially, we sent our bomb experts to investigate,” he said. Then, the moment the explosion occurred.
Jolo province data leader Sonny Abbing told a local radio station: “I approached the site when I heard a loud bang and saw the police and staff fall.”
Jolo’s mayor, Kerkhar Tan, issued a closing order after the explosions. Philippine coastguards in southwest Mindanao, as well as in the Sulu, Tawi-tawi, Basilan and Zamboanga regions, were put on alert after the explosions, according to local reports.
This month, Philippine troops captured five suspected Abu Sayyaf militants running under the direction of bomb expert Mundi Sawadjaan in Jolo. He escaped, but army officers said they believed the organization was looking for imaginable targets.
Sulu’s security forces were investigating the option that the wanted bomb maker, who is accused of orchestrating the church suicide bombing last year, were Monday’s explosions, said Major General Corleto Vinluan Jr. of The Western Mindanao Command.
“We’ve been chasing him since May,” he said.
Hannah Beech contributed to the Bangkok report.
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