The Philippine Armed Forces on Thursday confirmed that the terrorist group Abu Sayyaf had been producing their own rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs) which were used in last Monday's ambush of Marines in Indanan, Sulu on Monday that left eight soldiers dead, Xinhua reported.
In a press briefing in Camp Aguinaldo, the Armed Forces' public affairs office chief Lt. Col. Romeo Brawner Jr. said the Al Qaeda- linked Abu Sayyaf is patterning their production to the RPGs that were shipped from Vietnam in the 1990s.
"We are saying that the weapon they used in the ambush on the Marines were RPGs, and RPGs is not in the Armede Forces anymore. We are no longer using that long ago," said Branwer, discounting reports that the RPGs were from the military.
Brawner said the military establishment has phased out the RPGs from their inventory since the 1970s "due to difficulty of procuring ammunition, for practical reasons, they are hard to maintain."
"Definitely, they did not come from the military, they were not captured (from government troops). Most of their RPGs are homemade but they are using some originals and from what we know, these are foreign sourced," he said.
"They are producing their own RPGs," added Brawner without giving further details. He said that some Abu Sayyaf men were seen in some photographs with the homemade and original RPGs.
On Monday afternoon, Marine soldiers aboard military trucks were on their way to their base when they were waylaid by the terrorists at Bato-bato village, killing eight soldiers and nine others injured. Subsequent fighting left 15 terrorists dead and six others injured.
Abu Sayyaf producing rocket-propelled grenades: Philippine military
The Philippine Armed Forces on Thursday confirmed that the terrorist group Abu Sayyaf had been producing their own rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs) which were used in last Monday's ambush of Marines in Indanan, Sulu on Monday that left eight soldiers dead.
