Insurgency in the Philippines

The Philippines /ˈfɪlɨpiːnz/ FI-lə-peenz , officially known as the Republic of the Philippines is a sovereign country in... Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean. To its north across the Luzon Strait lies Taiwan. West across the South China Sea sits Vietnam. The Sulu Sea to the southwest lies between the country and the island of Borneo, and to the south the Celebes Sea separates it from other islands of Indonesia. It is bounded on the east by the Philippine Sea. Its location on the Pacific Ring of Fire and its tropical climate make the Philippines prone to earthquakes and typhoons but have also endowed the country with natural resources and made it one of the richest areas of biodiversity in the world. An archipelago comprising 7,107 islands, the Philippines is categorized broadly into three main geographical divisions: Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao. Its capital city is Manila. With an estimated population of about 98 million people, the Philippines is the 7th most populated Asian country and the 12th most populated country in the world. An additional 12.5 million Filipinos live overseas.
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The War on Terror is a term commonly applied to an international military campaign led by the United States and the United Kingdom with the support... of other NATO as well as non-NATO countries. Originally, the campaign was waged against al-Qaeda and other militant organizations with the purpose of eliminating them. The phrase 'War on Terror' was first used by US President George W. Bush and other high-ranking US officials to denote a global military, political, legal and ideological struggle against organizations designated as terrorist and regimes that were accused of having a connection to them or providing them with support or were perceived, or presented as posing a threat to the US and its allies in general. It was typically used with a particular focus on militant Islamists and al-Qaeda. Although the term is not officially used by the administration of US President Barack Obama , it is still commonly used by politicians, in the media and officially by some aspects of government, such as the United States' Global War on Terrorism Service Medal.
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2007 Basilan beheading incident occurred during an between the Moro Islamic Liberation Front rebels and the Philippine Army which led to the... execution of 14 or 23 members of the Philippine Marines, amongst them 11 beheaded in the province of Basilan in the southern Philippines. On June 10, 2007, Italian priest Giancarlo Bossi of the Pontifical Institute for Foreign Missions was kidnapped in Payao, Zamboanga Sibugay province. His captors were believed to be renegade MILF members or Abu Sayyaf. His captors have released photographs of Bossi as alive and well, but have not communicated with the Philippine government negotiators about any demands. Early operations of the Armed Forces of the Philippines were concentrated on Zamboanga Sibugay, in the belief that the captors had not left the province. On July 10, 2007, according to MILF chief negotiator Mohagher Iqbal, violence broke out at Tipo-Tipo, Basilan, a known Moro region, when Marines entered the town. Lieutenant Col.
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The North Cotabato conflict is a military confrontation between the Philippines armed forces and rogue MILF rebels in the North Cotabato province of... Mindanao. 1000 MILF rebels under the command of Umbra Kato have seized control of thirty five villages in the North Cotabato province. 2000 Philippine troops with helicopters and artillery were sent in to the seized area on August 9 to liberate it from the rebels. The MILF had wanted North Cotabato to be included in the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao. The government and MILF had been negotiating for the inclusion of the province in the Muslim Autonomous Region but the Supreme Court had struck down the proposal after hearing concern from local Christian leaders in the region. The rebel troops were ordered to leave the area by their commanders but the contingents under Kato refused to leave the villages they had occupied and instead dug in. The Philippine Army responded on the 9th of August by bombarding them. The next day, the government forces moved to retake the villages recapturing two of them from the rebels.
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