(It is rooted in a long-standing blood feud. The other group (Latip) entered the place where the other group (Sultan) allegedly lived. There are conflicts that lasted for a year. The land in question is around 45 hectares.)

“It is a manageable area, a border-controlled checkpoint for the Philippine Army and the PNP. “Pumasok is using the Bangsamoro Adjoc Joint Action Group to operate nationwide,” he added.

(The area is currently manageable as the Philippine Army and PNP have established checkpoints and border control. The Bangsamoro Adjoc Joint Action Group has also joined the discussion to resolve the conflict.)

Villagers who fled during the height of the fighting have returned to their communities, said Army Lt. Col. Roden Orbon, a spokesman for the 6th Infantry Division.

The clashes are the latest reminder of the complex security challenges that have long dogged Mindanao, a country rich in resources and potential but long hobbled by severe poverty, weak law enforcement, a glut of unlicensed firearms and a host of insurgents and outlaws.

The MILF was the largest Muslim separatist armed group in Mindanao until it signed a peace agreement with the government in 2014. It later abandoned its separatist goal and accepted a better-financed Muslim autonomous region called Bangsamoro in the unstable south.

The six-province Muslim region is now ruled by former rebel leaders in a transitional arrangement ahead of regular elections in May next year.

However, thousands of guerrillas from the rebel front were still holding onto their firearms as they awaited the government’s amnesty and livelihood package as part of the peace agreement. (TPM/AP/SunStar Philippines)