Mutineers Misled: Philippine Military

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Sunday, July 27, 2003

Mutineers Misled: Philippine Military

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The group of junior military officers who launched a mutiny in the Makati business district of Metro Manila before dawn Sunday appeared to be misinformed regarding accusations hurled against the government and the defense establishment, government and military officials said.

"They are making their move based on wrong information fed to them by their sources. What they are saying and doing is not correct," Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) vice chief of staff Rodolfo Garcia said.

Army and Navy junior officers and soldiers accused by the government of planning a coup attempt said in a statement early Sunday that it was withdrawing its allegiance from the government of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo and asking the president to step down.

The group, calling itself Magdalo, accused the Arroyo administration, through the Department of Defense headed by Defense Secretary Angelo Reyes, of selling arms to the various armed insurgent groups faced by the military.

As a result, the statement said, Filipino soldiers fighting therebels are being killed by bullets and weapons from their own arsenal.

It also claimed that the explosions that rocked the southern city of Davao earlier this year that killed 38 people were masterminded by Secretary Reyes and military intelligence chief Brigadier General Victor Corpus as part of a plan to brand the separatist Moro Islamic Liberation Front as a terrorist group in a bid to secure military aid from the United States.

The group also said President Arroyo was planning to declare martial law in August to extend her term.

Arroyo's National Security Adviser Roilo Golez denied that the government has ever considered martial law as an option to deal with perceived threats to its existence.

Reyes said the government intends to seek a peaceful solution to the mutiny, but the demand for the resignation of the president is non-negotiable.

The group of renegade servicemen occupied part of the Ayala Center shopping mall in Makati before dawn Sunday and set up explosives booby traps outside department stores, hotels and condominiums in the mall.

One of the leaders of the group, identified as Navy Lieutenant Senior Grade Antonio Trillanes, earlier said that they meant no harm to anyone, adding that "we are putting these (explosives) to defend ourselves."

Trillanes, one of the 10 officers arrested by order of President Arroyo on Saturday when she revealed a military plot to overthrow her government, claimed the group had 2,000 members in the area.

AFP public information officer Lieutenant Colonel Danilo Lucero warned on television that "appropriate force" would be used against the mutineers.

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