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Palace welcomes inclusion of Maute group in US list of terrorist organizations


Malacañang on Wednesday welcomed the inclusion of the Maute group, an Islamic State affiliate, in the United States government's terror list, calling it a "positive development" in the fight against terrorism.

"This reaffirms our long-held belief that the Maute Group is composed of local terrorists aided by foreign extremists," presidential spokesperson Harry Roque said in a statement. 

"This likewise recognizes the decisive action we have taken in liberating Marawi from these terrorists, which resulted in the success of the government in thwarting the establishment of an Islamic caliphate in the area and the containing of the rebellion from spreading to other parts of the Philippines," he added.

Government forces battled the Maute group for five months from May last year, leaving more than 1,000 people dead, mostly terrorists, and displacing hundreds of thousands.

Addressing the International Conference on Mobilizing Law Enforcement Efforts To Defeat ISIS in Washington D.C. on Tuesday, US Ambassador-at-Large and Coordinator for Counterterrorism Nathan Sales also held the Maute group responsible for the Davao City market bombing in September 2016, which killed 15 people and wounded 70 others.

"Terrorism, indeed, knows no borders and the inclusion of the Maute Group in the list of Specially Designated Global Terrorists and Foreign Terrorist Organizations as an affiliate group of ISIS shows the solidarity and resolve of the international community to flush out evil forces to make the world safe and secure," Roque said.

Apart from the Maute group, the US also added ISIS-West Africa, ISIS-Somalia, ISIS-Egypt, ISIS-Bangladesh, and Jund al-Khilafah-Tunisia to its sanctions list for global terrorism.

"Today’s designations join the eight ISIS-affiliated groups we’ve previously listed. We’ve designated these groups and individuals to illuminate ISIS’s global network, and to emphasize that the campaign against ISIS is far from over. These designations will deny the ISIS network the resources it needs to carry out terrorist attacks," Sales said. —KG, GMA News

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