The Australian Defence Force yesterday said it would send two military surveillance aircraft to assist Philippine soldiers fighting Islamic militants, as the archipelago nation battles to regain control of the southern city of Marawi.
“The Government of the Philippines has accepted an Australian offer of two Australian Defence Force AP-3C Orion aircraft to provide surveillance support to the Armed Forces of the Philippines,” Australian Minister for Defence Marise Payne said in an e-mailed statement.
“The regional threat from terrorism, in particular from DAESH and foreign fighters, is a direct threat to Australia and our interests,” she said in the statement, referring to the Islamic State by one of its Arabic acronyms.
The seizure of Marawi five weeks ago by Muslim rebels and the security forces’ fight to regain control of it has already claimed 369 lives, according to official estimates.
It has also alarmed Southeast Asian nations which fear that the Islamic State group — on a back foot in Iraq and Syria — is trying to set up a stronghold in the Muslim south of the mainly Roman Catholic Philippines that could threaten the entire region.
Indonesian and Malaysian warships launched joint counterinsurgency maneuvers with Philippine vessels in nearby waters.
The US has deployed troops near the besieged city, although they are not fighting there, and also provided a P-3 surveillance plane to assist the Philippines in battle.
Australia’s statement condemned the attack on Marawi, but gave no details about where the aircraft would be deployed.
This week, Philippine forces made a renewed push to retake the city, aiming to clear it by the weekend Eid al-Fitr.
A Philippine military official on Thursday said about 100 armed militants remain there, confined to an area of about 1km2. That figure is less than the estimated 400 to 500 fighters who seized the city on May 23.
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
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