Police believed to be the target as Philippine mosque attack injures 15

Rasa - At least 18 people, mostly police officers, were injured after two successive blasts targeted a mosque on a remote southern Philippine island, security sources say.

News ID: 2620

Date: 30 May 2015 - 20:34

RNA - According to police, fifteen people including 10 police officers were wounded in an attack on a mosque in Jolo town on the southern Philippine island of Mindanao o Friday.

“It seems the [first] explosion was set up to draw responders as the target,” the provincial police chief senior superintendent Abraham Orbita told reporters.

Three of the five civilian causalities injured in the first explosion were children and 10 police officers were wounded by the improvised explosive device that detonated less than 10 minutes later, police said.

No group has so far claimed responsibility for the attacks, but Philippine officials often blame such incidents on militant groups such as Abu Sayyaf, said to have had links with al-Qaeda.

The Philippine militants have been behind many of the worst terror attacks in the Southeast Asian state over the past years, including the 2004 bombing of a ferry that killed more than 100 people.

The militant groups seek to establish an independent homeland in the troubled south of the Philippines.

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