Troops brace for terrorist retaliation after deadly clashes in BARMM

COTABATO CITY - Police and military forces are jointly guarding against possible retaliation by remnants of two regional terror groups that lost seven members in an encounter in Barangays Manaulanan and Balong in Tugunan town, Bangsamoro Special Geographic Area, early Saturday, September 19.

Tugunan is one of eight predominantly Moro towns in the Bangsamoro Special Geographic Area, which is under the Bangsamoro regional government but geographically located within Cotabato province in Region 12.

The gunmen killed in clashes in Sitio Gawang in Barangay Manaulanan and nearby farming enclaves in Tugunan were among the few remaining members of the Dawlah Islamiya and the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters who had not availed themselves of the joint reconciliation program of the Army's 6th Infantry Division and the Police Regional Office-Bangsamoro Autonomous Region for violent religious extremists.