Marawi’s Grand Mosque, police station now secured from militants

By Ian Nicolas P. Cigaral, Reporter

THE military on Friday, Aug. 25, said troops were able to regain control of the Grand Mosque and a police station located at the heart of besieged Marawi City, provincial capital of Lanao del Sur, where state forces are battling pro-Islamic State (IS) militants.

Clashes erupted in Marawi on May 23 and are now well into their third month, under an environment of martial law as President Rodrigo R. Duterte had also declared that day.

In a press briefing at Malacañang, Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) Spokesperson Brigadier-General Restituto F. Padilla, Jr. said advancing troops were able to recover the city’s Grand Mosque and police station through an “envelopmental approach.”

He said such developments were “very important operational achievements.”

“So having it under the hands of government provides us the impetus to symbolically say that nakuha na natin ‘yung sentro mismo ng bayan (that we have captured the city center). Ganon din ‘yung Marawi City Police Station, kasi ito’y place of authority (The same with the Marawi City Police Station, because this is a place of authority),” Mr. Padilla said.

But retaking the two buildings, which were located in the city’s strategic points, was not easy, Mr. Padilla said, adding that enemy resistance led to three soldiers wounded.

He said the military’s efforts to seize control of the Grand Mosque took almost a month. No civilian hostages were found inside the place of worship, Mr. Padilla said.

“We did not conduct a frontal attack because we wanted to preserve the Grand Mosque, owing to the promise of our Commander-in-Chief, the President, and our Chief of Staff, who strongly provided guidance not to destroy any place of worship even if international protocols would allow us to do that,” the military spokesman said.

“So for almost a month, we took over or tried to get all the facilities around the Grand Mosque in an envelopmental approach. It was not a frontal attack, but an envelopmental approach that targeted all nearby installations around the Grand Mosque so that we can constrict it,” he added.

The band of gunmen that overran Marawi was led by Lanao-based Omarkhayam and Abdullah Maute, who had joined forces with Isnilon Hapilon, leader of the dreaded kidnapping-for-ransom gang Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG).

Authorities earlier said the Maute terrorists have converted commercial buildings in Marawi – a significant Muslim city in the predominantly Catholic Philippines – into defensive and staging positions, and the madrasas (Islamic schools) and mosques as snipers’ nests.

According to Mr. Padilla, the Islamist militants who occupied Marawi’s Grand Mosque might have fled to other nearby mosques, where the next military offensives will be focused.

Last month, Congress overwhelmingly voted to extend Mr. Duterte’s martial rule in Mindanao until yearend to defeat the band of jihadist extremists that overran the predominantly Muslim city and to dismantle the terror network in the region.

Mr. Duterte visited the war-torn city last Thursday for the third time, where he set foot on the main battle area and fired a shot at enemy positions.

“So whether there was a target hit [by the President], they did not say,” Mr. Padilla said.

“So he just wanted to perhaps show our troops that he was one with them every step of the way,” he added.

As of Aug. 25, security forces have neutralized 596 enemies in Marawi while government casualties reached 129.

The number of civilians killed by bandits in the course of the urban warfare remains at 45, while air strikes and artillery bombings by troops as well as deadly street combats have left the city in ruins.

On Wednesday, French aid groups said intense fighting in Mindanao combined with extreme weather events created a “humanitarian catastrophe” in the strife-torn southern region.

But the government, in response, insisted that it is addressing all the needs of people displaced by the Marawi siege.

“We do not think it’s a humanitarian crisis because we’re addressing the situation that’s happening,” Deputy Administrator for Administration of the Office of Civil Defense Kristoffer James Purisima told Palace reporters yesterday.

“We know what’s happening on the ground and we’re addressing all the needs of our IDPs (internally displaced persons), whether they be in our evacuation centers or home-based,” he added.