22 hurt in Cotabato New Year’s Eve grenade attack

COTABATO CITY — Two men riding a motorcycle together left 22 revelers, including children, wounded after a grenade attack at Barangay Dalapitan in Matalam town in Cotabato at about midnight on Wednesday.

Lt. Col. Arniel C. Melocotones, Matalam police chief, and local executives separately told reporters on Thursday morning that one of the two motorcycle-riding men threw a fragmentation grenade at the victims, then setting off firecrackers and pyrotechnics along a highway in Sitio Ipil-Ipil in Barangay Dalapitan, and motored away immediately.

Barangay officials and police investigators who responded to the incident said the grenade blast that ripped through the area hurting 22 revelers, among them grade school children.

The incident triggered panic among villagers in Barangay Dalapitan.

The victims, who sustained shrapnel wounds in different parts of their bodies, were immediately transported by policemen and emergency responders from the Matalam local government unit to different hospitals for treatment.

Governor Emmylou Taliño-Mendoza, chairperson of the multi-sector Cotabato Provincial Peace and Order Council, has condemned the bombing and urged local officials in Matalam and residents of Barangay Dalapitan to help the police identify its perpetrators.

“Our provincial government will provide the victims essential support that they will need for the treatment of their injuries,” Ms. Mendoza said.

Brig. Gen. Arnold P. Ardiente, director of the Police Regional Office 12, said Mr. Melocotones and his subordinates in the Matalam Municipal Police Station, intelligence agents from the Cotabato Provincial Police Office and local officials are cooperating in identifying the two men behind the bombing for prosecution.

Army Brig. Gen. Ricky P. Bunayog, commander of the 602^nd Infantry Brigade, and his superior, Major Gen. Jose Vladimir R. Cagara, commander of the 6^th Infantry Division, separately said plainclothes operatives from their intelligence units in the province are helping the police put a closure to the incident. — John Felix M. Unson