Ex-rebels seize Philippines port

Outgunned security guards and several civilian employees were expelled from the administration building by the gunmen, municipal council member Gaudencio Teves said. Armed with assault rifles and wearing their old MNLF uniforms, the gunmen arrived at the facility at daybreak led by Abdul Rachman Lidasan, a former ranking guerrilla commander.

Pollok is one of the busiest ports in the main southern island of Mindanao. Teves said the gunmen are MaguindanaoMuslims. They apparently resented the fact that other MNLF units which belonged to the Tausug Muslim faction had obtained jobs as security men for the southern Philippine ports of Jolo, Bongao and Pollok. The MNLF leader, Nur Misuari, is a member of the Tausug Muslim faction.

Police special forces units deployed outside the facility and government negotiators were in contact with the MNLF gunmen, Teves said. He said the men apparently had not taken any hostages or harmed anyone, but were demanding work as security guards at the Port. The MNLF was the main Muslim separatist insurgency in the southern Philippines until 1996, when it signed a peace settlement with the government, ending its 24-year rebellion.

The peace accord provided for limited Muslim self-rule in four southern Philippines provinces and the integration of 5,500 guerrillas into the military and 1,500 others into the police forces.

However, part of the rebel force has refused to disarm. Some of them had been linked to kidnapping incidentsin which they demanded livelihood projects from the government in exchange for the freedom of their hostages.Monday8217;s action occurred hours before the Philippine government launched peace talks with a second Muslim separatist guerrilla faction, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front in Sultan Kudarat.