Government forces ready to foil communist attacks--PNP

MANILA, Philippines -- Government forces are ready to thwart communist attacks, officials said following threats of more rebel offensives in response to President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s “outright threat to use state terror.”

Philippine National Police (PNP) Director General Oscar Calderon on Thursday said he has ordered intensified security operations to stop the New People’s Army from staging deadly attacks on soldiers and policemen and destroying infrastructures like telecommunication towers.

"If the NPA vows to continue their destructive venture by staging more attacks on government troops and vital installations, we are ready to stop them anytime and anywhere in order to preserve peace and democracy in this country," Calderon said.

CPP Orders NPA To Escalate Offensives

Gregorio "Ka Roger" Rosal, spokesman of the Communist Party of the Philippines, said the CPP leadership has directed its fighters “to intensify its armed struggle and launch more and more tactical offensives against the Arroyo regime to weaken it and contribute to its speedy ouster.”

“Arroyo is displaying all-out fascist arrogance in asserting the full force of the state’s coercive instrumentalities. With the Human Security Act in her hands, she mistakenly believes that she can silence the Filipino people’s intensifying clamor for her ouster,” Rosal said in a statement.

During her seventh annual address Monday, Arroyo vowed never to “stand idly by when anyone gets in the way of the national interest and tries to block the national vision. From where I sit, I can tell you, a President is always as strong as she wants to be."

PNP spokesman Chief Superintendent Samuel Pagdilao meanwhile said that communist insurgency could be a test case in implementing the Human Security Act, a landmark anti-terror law that took effect on July 15.

"The NPA is undoubtedly engaged in rebellion and insurrection and its objective is to supplant our democratic government and way of life with a communist system through violent acts," said Pagdilao, noting that the insurgents’ acts "constitute the very elements needed to apply the anti-terrorism law."

Philippine security officials plan to recommend the inclusion of the communist rebels in a list of terrorist organizations that would be drawn up under the anti-terror law.

The Maoist rebels, who have been waging a rural-based rebellion for 39 years, are already in US and European Union terrorist lists.

The military recently recommended the resumption of long-stalled government peace talks with the rebels on condition they agree to an immediate ceasefire.

The guerrillas rejected an immediate truce and said they would return to peace negotiations only if the government stops the killings of leftwing activists blamed by the rebels on alleged military hit squads and take steps that would lead to their removal from US and EU terror lists. With a report from The Associated Press