Malaysian police said Tuesday they were hunting suspected contract killers after a bank founder was gunned down in broad daylight in Kuala Lumpur, fuelling fears of rampant violent crime in the Southeast Asian country. …read more
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Police say a Bahrain-born banker who founded Malaysia’s fifth largest bank has been shot to death in Kuala Lumpur. …read more
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BBC Sport is reporting that Bernie Ecclestone, Formula One boss and indicted briber, has said the Indian Grand Prix will “probably not” happen in 2014. The race, which takes place at the purpose-built Buddh International Circuit, is in danger due to a combination of reasons, including Ecclestone’s desire to move India from its current slot in October to the beginning of the season, in March or April.
According to the BBC, this is to accommodate a schedule envisioned by Ecclestone that adds races in Austria, New Jersey and Russia, in addition to the current 19-race calendar. Why the shuffle, though? The teams aren’t too excited about a longer season, and Ecclestone is hoping that by moving India to the start of the season, with China, Malaysia and the season opener in Australia, he can knock out four of the seven Asia-Pacific-region races in one fell swoop.
This poses a problem for India, though, as it’d be forced to run a race in October of 2014 and then do the whole thing over again in six or seven months. According to the head of India’s motorsports federation, Vicky Chandhok, that doesn’t give the country enough recovery time, with Chandhok going so far as to say the early season date “would be impossible for us in terms of finances and resources.”
There’s also a dustup over India’s import tax, that could hamper this year’s race. The Indian government is attempting to tax teams on their Indian earnings rather than on their profits, which would result in teams having to paying considerably more in taxes.
2013 marks only the third F1 race at the Buddh Circuit. But if Bernie doesn’t get his way, and the tax issues aren’t sorted, the track could go the way of Turkey’s Istanbul Park, another circuit built solely to attract F1, that lasted a mere six seasons before being dropped from the calendar.
Indian Grand Prix in jeopardy? originally appeared on Autoblog on Mon, 29 Jul 2013 17:59:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Haze blanketed parts of Malaysia on Monday, weeks after the region suffered its worst pollution from forest fires in Indonesia in more than a decade. …read more
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English football giants Chelsea cruised to a 4-1 victory over a Malaysian selection as part of their pre-season Asia tour on Sunday. …read more
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Malaysian police on Saturday detained 14 people protesting against ongoing negotiations for a huge trans-Pacific free trade deal, an activist said. …read more
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Several Islamic groups on Friday demanded the recall of the Vatican’s first envoy to Malaysia, describing him as an “enemy of the state” after he supported the use of the word “Allah” by non-Muslims.
Dozens of protesters gathered outside the Vatican’s mission in Kuala Lumpur, the capital of Muslim-majority Malaysia, after prayers on Friday, urging the government to expel Archbishop Joseph Marino.
Marino, who arrived in Kuala Lumpur less than six months ago, recently elicited a rebuke from the government after he waded into a religious row over the right to translate “God” to “Allah” in Malay-language Bibles and other literature.
He had described arguments supporting the move put forward by the Catholic Church in an ongoing court battle with the government over the issue, as “logical and acceptable”.
He was on Tuesday summoned to the foreign ministry over his remarks, and has since apologised.
It was not enough for some Muslim organisations in the country, however.
“Joseph Marino is an enemy of the state. His actions have strained race relations in the country,” said Ibrahim Ali, president of right-wing group Perkasa.
Ibrahim has previously drawn controversy by calling for the burning of the Bible.
“Marino must leave Malaysia,” said Hasan Ali, the head of Islamic group JATI, who urged the government to close the mission and not to accept any envoy from the Vatican.
The government has argued that the word “Allah” should only be used by Muslims, as it fears using the word in Malay-language Bibles is an attempt to confuse and proselytise.
On Thursday, a Malaysian couple known for publishing a sexually explicit blog were charged with sedition and denied bail after they caused outrage with a prank Ramadan greeting on Facebook that showed them eating pork — which is forbidden in Islam.
Malaysia has more than 2.5 million Christians in a population of 28 million, of which about 60 percent are Muslim.
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Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd says all refugees who arrive in Australia by boat will be resettled on the South Pacific island nation of Papua New Guinea.
Rudd and Papua New Guinea Prime Minister Peter O’Neill signed an agreement in the Australian east coast city of Brisbane on Friday that will enable Australia to deport refugees to its developing neighbor.
The move aims to deter an escalating number of asylum seekers who travel to Australia in rickety fishing boats from poor, war-torn homelands through countries including Indonesia and Malaysia.
The growing influx poses a major political problem for Rudd’s Labor Party which is the clear underdog in elections expected within months.
Immigration Minister Tony Burke says the rule will apply to refugees who arrive from Friday.
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Well, supersonic jet travel may be practical, but will the market pay the price? For years, Jeff Miller has been exploring an array of issues surrounding the feasibility of supersonic business jet development. This is part one of a two-part series where he addresses some of the questions and provokes many more. Jeff Miller (bravojjm@gmail.com) specializes in corporate communications for the business aviation and luxury goods markets, and operates his own advertising agency dedicated to brand marketing. He has led corporate communications for Learjet and Gulfstream. The Anchorage airport has become a typical refueling stop for U.S.-to-Asia business jet flights. The aim is to get in and out fast. The terminals (known as FBOs) that service business aircraft are practiced at turning business flights quickly—sometimes in just 30 minutes. Passengers and pilots want to minimize ground delays. After all, business jets are only midway through 15 or 16-hour journeys. Sure, some of the newest intercontinental-range jets like the Gulfstream G650 and the Bombardier Global 8000, which boast extraordinary 8000 or 9000 statute miles range (effectively the distance between Chicago and Singapore), can eliminate the fuel stop. Even so, long-range business travel has a downside. It takes a physical toll on the toughest executives even when they’re flying aboard the most well-appointed business jets offering productive, comfortable cabins with outstanding eating, sleeping and work amenities. Still, it’s not uncommon for senior executives to make more than one trip from Brazil or the U.S. to Asia every month, and traffic flows the other way, too, with executives from Taiwan, Hong Kong and elsewhere heading to the Americas. Would these executives pay a 30 or 40 percent premium for a supersonic jet to cut those missions to half the time or less? The answer is almost certainly yes. The rationale for a supersonic business jet is stronger today than when companies such as Gulfstream, Dassault and others began displaying Concorde-like models at trade shows more than a decade ago. At that time, the principal market for business jets was in the U.S., with business aircraft designed principally for U.S. coast-to-coast or U.S. to Europe routes. Trade patterns have changed, and the action today is not just in major business jet destinations and markets in China, India, Brazil and Russia, but also in Australia, Malaysia, South Korea, Turkey, South Africa, Nigeria and the United Arab Emirates among many other emerging global trade destinations. The number one criterion for business jet purchasers, according to Honeywell Aerospace, is range. It is no wonder that a jet such as the Mach 0.925 Gulfstream G650 sells so well, even though it is, in truth, only modestly faster than an earlier generation of jets. The G650 will still save an hour on the longest trips, and with more than 200 purchased the first day it went on sale, the market has resoundingly indicated that an hour saved is worth paying for. Even before the economic emergence of China and other rapid growth regions outside of North America and Europe, …read more
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The Vatican’s first-ever envoy to Malaysia has apologised for supporting the use of the word “Allah” by non-Muslims after he was summoned by the foreign minister.
Archbishop Joseph Marino issued a statement late Tuesday, after meeting with Foreign Minister Anifah Aman, saying his comments were “never intended as an attempt to intrude into the internal affairs of the country”.
Marino, who arrived in Kuala Lumpur less than six months ago, had last Thursday waded into a religious row in Muslim-majority Malaysia over the use of the word “Allah”.
He described arguments put forward by the Catholic Church in an ongoing court battle for the right to translate “God” as “Allah” in Malay-language Bibles and other literature as “logical and acceptable”.
Soon after, hardline Muslim groups began calling for him to be sent home. Several cabinet ministers also accused him of “interference”.
“In that context, he asked him (Anifah) to convey apologies for any misunderstandings and inconveniences that it may have caused,” the statement said.
Anifah also said that “Archbishop Marino was advised to be mindful of the religious sensitivities of the host country and that the issue he commented on is still under the Court of Appeal”.
Controversy over the use of the word “Allah” came to a head three years ago, when the High Court ruled that non-Muslims are allowed to use the word to refer to God in their Malay-language literature.
The court case arose after Malaysia’s Catholic Church sued the government for banning the use of the word in its weekly newspaper, The Herald.
Muslims had denounced the verdict, claiming “Allah” is exclusive to Islam. The government decided to appeal the ruling after several places of worship were fire-bombed.
Malaysia has more than 2.5 million Christians in a population of 28 million, of which about 60 percent are Muslim.
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Asylum-seekers drowning on the treacherous boat journey to Australia presented a “god-awful” problem, Home Affairs Minister Jason Clare said, after four more deaths were reported following a dramatic sea rescue.
Authorities pulled 144 people from the surging waters off the Indian Ocean territory of Christmas Island late Tuesday, but they also recovered four bodies after the ship carrying an estimated 150 people capsized and sank.
“This is a wretchedly difficult area and it has been poisoned by politics,” Clare said of boatpeople.
“If we are going to fix this god-awful problem then we need to work together.”
Australia has struggled to stem an influx of asylum-seekers arriving by boat, with record numbers turning up in 2012 and more than 13,000 so far in 2013.
Hundreds have drowned making the journey and Canberra’s plans to send asylum-seekers to remote Pacific islands for processing has so far failed to stop the numbers from increasing.
Clare said the centre-left Labor government — whose scheme to transfer asylum-seekers arriving by boats to refugee camps in Malaysia was blocked by the conservative opposition — was working on changes to its policy.
But he said the problem required domestic and regional cooperation and Australians wanted the political parties to work together on the issue.
“We have been fighting about this for more than 10 years,” he said.
“The government should be given the power it needs to stop people dying at sea.”
In the latest tragedy, the boat capsized as it was being escorted in heavy weather by two Australian navy ships to Christmas Island, after issuing a distress call earlier in the day.
The boats pulled survivors from the water as a military aircraft dropped life rafts.
Rear Admiral David Johnston, commander of Border Protection Command, said the 30-metre boat had not been as “jam packed” as other vessels that had been intercepted and appeared quite solid.
But he said the vessel, which was carrying men, women and children, sank quite quickly once it overturned.
Australian border protection officials have been faced with an increased tempo of arrivals in recent months, despite scores of drownings.
On Friday a boat carrying 97 asylum-seekers sank, claiming the life of a baby boy and leaving eight others missing.
In a bid to slow down arrivals, Australia’s refugee tribunals have reportedly been ordered to take revised country assessments into account when looking at asylum claims from people from Iran, Afghanistan and Vietnam.
This directive came after Foreign Minister Bob Carr said many people seeking asylum, particularly from Iran, were economic migrants, not refugees.
Prime Minister Kevin Rudd is expected to soon announce a new-look asylum-seeker policy — an issue set to be key in elections due this year.
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The United States’ top naval commander in Asia described military relations with China as “collegial” and rejected Cold War comparisons, urging “methodical and thoughtful” diplomacy in the region.
Vice Admiral Scott Swift, commander of the Japan-based US 7th Fleet and in Sydney for bilateral exercises, said maritime security was an increasingly important issue in the Indo-Pacific region as both trade and militarisation boomed.
“Economic power is being converted to military power in many parts of the region, which may increase the temptation to use coercion or force in an attempt to resolve differences between nations,” he said in a speech to the Lowy Institute foreign policy think-tank.
“The rising of the seas and the opening of the (Arctic’s) Northern Passage will bring new security challenges that must be dealt with as well,” he added, speaking of global warming’s impact in the region.
Swift said he was “very encouraged by the pace” of military connections in the region amid escalating tensions over issues including the South China Sea.
China claims nearly all of the sea, rejecting competing claims to parts of it by the Philippines, Vietnam, Brunei, Malaysia and Taiwan.
Some of the claimants have expressed concern at Beijing’s increasingly assertive military and diplomatic tactics to stress its control.
US President Barack Obama warned China last week against using force or intimidation in its maritime disputes and urged a peaceful resolution.
Swift said his focus was on inclusive military operations, seeking “to the maximum extent possible multilateral exercises”, adding he had had “very collegial exchanges with PLAN (Chinese navy) ships throughout the region, and really throughout the world”.
“We need to be methodical and thoughtful about the process by which we pull the relationships together,” he said.
“In the past I think there’s been a rush to achieve a form of success without fully understanding what success is, especially in the context of the parties that are coming together.”
Swift said he believed military collaboration with China was “bringing us closer” to a naval understanding similar to that which existed between the US and the Soviet Union to prevent conflict at sea during the Cold War.
But he distanced himself from comparisons with the 40-year US-Soviet standoff, saying there were “very, very different circumstances”, starting with the fact that the 7th Fleet was as large as the entire Chinese navy.
“We have much more in common than we do have in competition with China,” Swift added.
“The Cold War was really a competition between governments, competition between our militaries, who was the strongest was the question of the day. I just don’t see that in today’s maritime environment.”
Swift said he was “heartened” by the role of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations in the region and welcomed discussions about whether its mandate should extend beyond economic issues.
“The instability that is resident within the South China Sea is really ringed by all those countries that are participants in ASEAN, so its relevance is much higher than what it was even four or five years ago,” he said.
“If it grows into a maritime focus more than what …read more
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Thailand is considering reducing the number of troops in its insurgency-riven south if a lull in violence holds, the deputy prime minister said on Tuesday.
“We won’t withdraw troops from the area but we can reduce the number and focus on development rather than fighting,” Deputy Prime Minister Pracha Promnog, who oversees national security, told reporters.
His remarks came after the Thai government and the Barisan Revolusi Nasional (BRN) Muslim rebel group agreed to curb violence during Ramadan.
So far, in the first week of the holy month “there was very little violence and no loss of life, only injuries,” he added.
“We can say that the BRN is sincere to a certain extent based on its behaviour,” he said.
Nearly a decade of conflict in Thailand’s southernmost provinces has left more than 5,700 people dead.
Thailand has about 60,000 troops stationed in the south.
Despite four rounds of peace talks since March, continued bloodshed before Ramadan had raised questions about how much control rebel leaders have over radical militants.
In one of the deadliest attacks, eight soldiers were killed when a roadside blast ripped through their truck last month.
But now the situation “is moving in a positive direction,” said Thailand’s National Security Council chief and lead peace negotiator Paradorn Pattanatabut.
According to Malaysia, which is hosting peace talks, Thai security forces pledged to avoid aggressive action for a 40-day period from July 10 to August 18, while the BRN agreed to refrain from violent attacks.
Under the plan, Thai authorities have removed a number of roadblocks and the military has withdrawn its personnel from some villages in a bid to ease tension.
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Pakistan sacked their hockey coach Monday over the national team’s poor finish in the World Hockey League, which raised fears they will not qualify for next year’s World Cup.
Hanif Khan, a gold medallist from the 1984 Olympics, served as coach during this month’s League in Malaysia where Pakistan dropped to seventh after topping the group phase.
“We have replaced Khan with Tahir Zaman, our consultant, as coach while Akhtar Rasool will remain the head coach and manager,” Pakistan Hockey Federation (PHF) secretary Asif Bajwa told reporters.
The top three teams — Germany, Argentina and England — from the league qualified for the World Cup, to be held in the Netherlands next year.
Pakistan now must win next month’s Asia Cup — also scheduled in Malaysia — to earn a berth in the World Cup, an event introduced to field hockey in 1971.
“We took into account manager’s report as Khan failed to achieve an easy task,” said Bajwa of the League, where Pakistan lost to South Korea in the quarter-finals.
Zaman, a member of Pakistan’s last World Cup win in 1994 is a certified coach of the International Hockey Federation.
Khan lashed out at the decision to sack him.
“For the past two months there were efforts to displace me,” Khan told AFP. “I will hold a press conference to tell everyone about the politics in the PHF and of reasons for my ouster.”
Pakistan have won three Olympic gold medals in hockey and been world champions four times but have slumped at international level in the last few years.
They finished at their worst 12th and last in the 2010 World Cup held in India and were eighth and seventh respectively in the last two Olympics.
India, who also failed to qualify for the World Cup from a separate round of the league in the Netherlands, sacked their Australian coach Michael Nobbs earlier this month.
Besides Pakistan and India, South Korea, China, Malaysia and Japan will feature in the Asia Cup.
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An Indian-owned tanker headed to Bangladesh with 23 onboard caught fire in Malaysian waters, with one sailor feared dead, according to a maritime official.
The fire that broke out late Sunday in the engine room had now been contained, said western Johor state maritime enforcement chief Aminuddin Abdul Rashid.
“One crew member who was working in the engine room is unaccounted for and we believe he is dead,” he told AFP.
The Indian-owned tanker MT Samudera — carrying 23 Indian nationals — was heading to Chittagong from the Indonesian island of Batam.
“The tanker ship which usually carries fuel oil was not carrying any cargo. We rescued 22 crew members,” Aminuddin said.
“The tanker is not a threat to passing ships because it is outside the busy Malacca Strait,” he said, adding there was no immediate danger of the ship sinking.
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A Singapore policeman once portrayed as a model officer was charged over the gruesome double murder of a businessman and his son in a case that has shocked the city-state.
Senior Staff Sergeant Iskandar Rahmat, 34, was accused of killing car workshop owner Tan Boon Sin, 67, and his son Tan Chee Heong, 42, last Wednesday.
The older man was fatally slashed in his home while his son’s body was found a kilometre (half a mile) away after being dragged under one of the family’s cars, leaving a trail of blood on a busy road as other motorists watched in horror.
Iskandar, once portrayed as a model officer on the Singapore Police Force website, abandoned the car and fled to Malaysia by scooter but was quickly arrested and repatriated to Singapore.
Singapore media said the suspect, a married 14-year veteran of the force, was bankrupt and under an official investigation for failing to report his personal financial problems to his superiors. He was banned from carrying firearms while under investigation.
There was no immediate indication of a motive for the murders but a police spokesman confirmed reports that Iskandar had attended to a theft complaint filed by the elder Tan in November last year, after which the sergeant was reassigned to another position.
The case has shocked Singapore, a densely populated island of 5.3 million people which prides itself on its low crime rate.
According to official statistics, the number of murders in Singapore hit a 20-year low of 11 in 2012, down from 16 in 2011.
In a statement issued over the weekend, Police Commissioner Ng Joo Hee said: “Our police force and every policeman and policewoman is tarred by the actions of this single officer.”
“We have now captured officer Iskandar and we will prosecute him to the maximum extent. He is a murder suspect and will eventually receive just deserts for the heinous crime that he is accused of committing,” the police chief added.
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Seventeen spectators were crushed to death at a boxing match in remote eastern Indonesia after supporters of the loser started a riot, according to police.
“Seventeen people died in the crush, 12 of whom were women, and another 38 were injured and have been hospitalised for treatment,” Papua provincial police spokesman I Gede Sumerta Jaya told AFP.
Around 1,500 people had watched the local championship match late Sunday night at a stadium in the town of Nabire when supporters angered by the outcome began throwing chairs.
“Everyone else made a quick dash for the exit in fear the violence would get out of control, and dozens of people were trampled on,” Jaya said.
A witness, who did not want to be named, was quoted by news website Detik.com as saying: “There are five gates to the stadium, but only two were in operation during the match.
“So I just ran to the one closest to me.”
In 2011, two people were killed in a stampede when thousands of fans jammed a Jakarta stadium for the Southeast Asian Games football final between the home nation and rival Malaysia.
In February 2008, 10 young people were trampled or crushed to death as hundreds of music fans tried to force their way out of a rock concert in the city of Bandung.
In September the same year, at least 21 people were killed in a stampede in East Java as they crowded an alley to receive a cash handout for Ramadan.
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Southeast Asian nations gathering to discuss the annual shroud of hazardous smog that blights the region are unlikely to find any immediate solutions, despite a meeting to address the issue being brought forward by a month to Monday.
Officials from five ASEAN member countries that form the so-called “haze” committee are scheduled to hold two-day talks over Indonesian forest fires that sent clouds of smoke into Malaysia and Singapore last month before environment ministers head into a showdown Wednesday.
But leaders of the two affected nations, which said they were subjected to life-threatening levels of pollution, hold little hope of a significant outcome.
Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong admitted in early July the forest fires in Indonesia would take “a very long time” to eradicate because of Indonesia’s vast size.
“I know that there will be a spirit of cooperation but I think solving the haze issue will take a very long time, with the best will in the world,” he said.
Malaysia’s environment minister Palanivel Govindasamy refused to be drawn on immediate solutions to the haze which sent pollution levels to a 16-year high, forcing a state of emergency in two southern districts.
“Our job is to work closely with Indonesia and our ASEAN partners on the haze meeting. Once an agreement is reached we can go forward,” he told AFP after stressing “long-term solutions” would be the focus of the meeting.
Formally known as the Ministerial Steering Committee (MSC) Meeting on Transboundary Haze Pollution, the three nations along with Brunei and Thailand have met on 14 previous occasions since 2006, but have little to show for it.
The main obstacle appears to be internal Indonesian politics, as slash-and-burn remains the cheapest — albeit illegal — way to clear land for agriculture.
The government has sought parliament’s approval to ratify a 2002 pact on haze pollution which has been signed by all its ASEAN partners but the proposal was rejected in 2008.
Indonesian Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa said in June the treaty had been resubmitted to the current legislature, although no timeline for ratification was given.
Singapore and Malaysia have demanded Indonesia punish those behind the blazes, but Jakarta has hit back, saying fires have also been set in plantations owned by their neighbours, especially Malaysian palm oil firms.
Indonesian police said Friday they were investigating fires found in a concession held by the local subsidiary of Malaysia’s Kuala Lumpur Kepong, which last month denied allegations of using slash-and-burn methods.
The haze has been a bone of contention in ASEAN for nearly two decades, with the worst haze crisis in 1997-1998 estimated to have cost the region $9 billion.
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The Philippines said on Sunday it has clinched a key “wealth-sharing” deal with Muslim rebels, bringing it closer to ending a decades-old rebellion that has claimed tens of thousands of lives.
Chief peace negotiator Miriam Coronel-Ferrer said the government was cautiously optimistic of a final peace pact within weeks after the compromise deal with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) late Saturday following six days of gruelling talks.
“This signing indicates that both sides are really committed to finish the peace negotiations. Nobody wants this not to reach its fruition,” Ferrer told AFP after the wealth-sharing formula was signed.
Under the deal, the government has agreed to let the rebels have a 75 percent share of earnings from natural resources and metallic minerals in a proposed autonomous region for the Muslim minority in the southern Mindanao region, Ferrer said.
For energy resources, both sides agreed to split earnings equally following the talks hosted by neighbouring Malaysia.
“We are always optimistic, but that is always guided by a good sense of possibilities and constraints of our situation,” she said.
The government had initially bargained for a bigger share of the wealth, arguing that it wanted a deal that could withstand legal challenge in the Supreme Court.
Ferrer said a final peace deal with the 12,000-MILF could be signed after the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, which officially ends at the end of July.
The MILF has waged a guerrilla war for a separate Islamic state in Mindanao since the 1970s that has claimed an estimated 150,000 lives.
President Benigno Aquino’s government and the MILF signed a preliminary deal in October outlining the broad terms for a peace treaty that is expected to be signed before he ends his six-year term in 2016.
Ferrer, however, noted Sunday that both sides still had to agree on a formula over how to disarm the rebels as well as the extent of the powers of the autonomous region.
MILF vice chairman for political affairs Ghazali Jaafar said the group expected a “more contentious” round of negotiations ahead.
“The MILF fighters will not disarm unless clear conditions and terms for their safety are met,” Jaafar told AFP. “There must also be an assurance the fighters will be free from harassment from troops once they are disarmed, if ever.”
He said the rebels had originally wanted at least a 60-40 sharing scheme over energy resources, which include natural gas believed abundant in the south.
The proposed autonomous territory comprises areas the minority Muslims consider their “ancestral domain” in Mindanao, the country’s main southern island believed to have a large chunk of the country’s estimated $840 billion in gold, copper and other mineral reserves.
“Not all of us were totally satisfied with the outcome (of the talks),” Jaafar said.
Meanwhile, Ferrer warned that failure to seize the pact could be used by the small, violent break-away faction Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF) as a justification to sow further violence.
“A failure of the agreement can by used by groups like the BIFF who do not want the process to succeed — who say nothing will …read more
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Fresh fighting between Philippine troops and a renegade group of Muslim rebels left seven people dead on Saturday amid peace talks aimed at ending a decades-old rebellion, the military said.
The gunmen, who oppose the main Islamic rebel group’s negotiations with Manila, ambushed an army truck on the main southern island of Mindanao, regional military spokesman Colonel Dickson Hermoso said.
Two soldiers were wounded in the initial volley, but the army gave chase to the retreating gunmen and killed five of them, he said in a written report.
The pursuit also left two soldiers dead and four other soldiers wounded, Hermoso added.
Hermoso said the gunmen were members of the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters.
The group had mounted attacks on Mindanao on July 6, two days before the government resumed peace talks with the region’s main rebel group, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front.
The earlier fighting had left five soldiers and three gunmen dead and sparked fears that it would affect the peace talks.
The military however ended its pursuit of the renegade rebel force before the talks resumed in Malaysia on Monday.
The peace talks aim to create an autonomous region for the Muslim minority in Mindanao, the southern third of the mainly Catholic nation of 100 million.
The two sides signed a preliminary deal in October outlining the broad terms for a peace treaty that would be signed by 2016.
The Kuala Lumpur talks aim to spell out revenue-sharing terms with the national government in the self-rule area.
The talks were continuing on Saturday, President Benigno Aquino’s spokeswoman Abigail Valte said in an interview on government radio.
The 12,000-member MILF has waged a guerrilla war for a separate Islamic state in Mindanao since the 1970s that has claimed an estimated 150,000 lives.
The BIFF is led by Ameril Umbrakato, a Saudi Arabia-trained cleric who was expelled by the MILF in 2011 for his hardline stance against the peace talks.
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News
