American among three dead in blast outside Philippine army base

The Associated Press

MANILA, Philippines  - A nail-packed bomb killed an American Green Beret and two Filipinos yesterday outside a restaurant near a base in the troubled southern Philippines, where the U.S. military helped in the fight against al-Qaida-linked rebels this year.

The blast, from a bomb hidden on a motorcycle, wounded 25 people outside the restaurant, which is frequented by U.S. and Filipino soldiers, in the city of Zamboanga, officials said. Television footage showed a pool of blood and unconscious victims - some with their shirts bloodied - being loaded into ambulances.

No one claimed responsibility for the blast. Suspicion fell on Muslim extremists like the al-Qaida-linked Abu Sayyaf group and communist rebels who had threatened earlier in the day to attack police and military installations.

Security had already been tightened in advance of an Oct. 12 Christian festival in the middle of the southern islands that make up the archipelago's Muslim heartland. Amid worries over further attacks, more troops were being sent to the area, and checkpoints were set up on major roads and outside the city's power plant.

A homemade bomb also went off yesterday near the perimeter fence of a police headquarters in Imus town, in Cavite province south of Manila, damaging a parked car but causing no injuries, GMA7 television reported.

In addition, police walked bomb-sniffing dogs through 18 stations for an elevated train line running through Manila after receiving intelligence reports that communist rebels might stage an attack there yesterday.

A Philippine military official said officials were trying to see if the two situations were linked to the blast in Zamboanga, 530 miles south of Manila.

Some 1,200 U.S. troops were deployed this year in the Philippines to train the country's military to battle Abu Sayyaf in the southern islands. After the training exercise ended in July, the troops left, except for about 272 U.S. soldiers who remained, most in Zamboanga, for a humanitarian mission on nearby Basilan Island, once the center of Abu Sayyaf operations.

The 9 p.m. blast in Zamboanga ripped the roof off a small wooden house and damaged six shops across the street from the Camp Enrile army base, where some U.S. troops have been staying.

One of the Filipinos killed was the driver of the motorcycle, who “is suspected to have been the one who brought the bomb,” said Defense Secretary Angelo Reyes.

Army Col. Alexander Yapching, head of Task Force Zamboanga that is in charge of securing the city from terrorist attacks, said a U.S. Army master sergeant died en route to a hospital and another American was injured, along with five Filipino troops.

The wounded American's injuries did not appear to be life-threatening, said a high-ranking Philippine military source. One Green Beret soldier was killed and another was injured. They were on duty at the time of the blast, Pentagon spokeswoman Lt. Cmdr. Barbara Burfeind said.