MANILA – The Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) announced that there is no “direct verifiable and credible presence” of any international terrorist group in Mindanao.
This was stressed by AFP spokesperson Brig. Gen. Restituto Padilla in a briefing Monday.
“And we believe that the names of big groups like Daesh (another name for the Islamic State extremists) is only being brought into the conversation because of their desire to get further attention from many players out there in the field,” he added.
Padilla issued the statement in wake of claims made by Moro Islamic Liberation Front chair Murad Ebrahim saying that IS terrorists are capitalizing on the frustration of the Moro people over the non-passage of the Bangsamoro Basic Law (BBL) in order to gain a foothold in Mindanao.
“We are not putting much weight on those pronouncement but we’re putting much weight on the ability of our local terrorist organization within the locality to recruit from among the young members,” he added.
Regarding the stalled passage of the BBL, Padilla said peace process deals often go through long and ardous passages before being finalized.
The good thing is that many Muslim elders are telling the younger generation about the realities on the ground and assuring them that it is only part of the political dynamics, he added.
And in due time, once these realities have been observed, a more lasting peace mechanism will be crafted in due time.
“We are banking and very optimistic on the commitment of so many sectors to peace and that is the only that matters to us for the moment but this is the warning that we have as an Armed Forces, if there are forces out there who will challenge the primacy of the peace process and who will challenge and try to disturb the peace we can guarantee you that the full force of the miltiary, our Armed Forces, will be applied to all these threat forces,” Padilla said.