A series of raids have been launched on a compound owned by processed foods manufacturer and marketer Del Monte Philippines, at Camp Phillips in Bukidnon, a landlocked province in the Northern Mindanao region.
Approximately 150 Communist Party Fighters from the Philippine’s New People’s Army attacked at 6pm local time on Tuesday (19 February), according to an InterAksyon news report.
Del Monte security guards were caught off-guard by the raids, with one killed after sustaining two gunshot wounds and three injured.
A spokesman from the Army’s 4th Infantry Division, Lieutenant Colonel Eugenio Osias, reported that the rebels arrived in two trucks at the Del Monte compound. They burnt the company fertiliser warehouse and logistics office.
Del Monte Philippines was part of the US-owned multinational until the 1980s, when Filipino investors began buying into the company. Now under Filipino ownership and management, it continues to supply canned pineapple under an agreement with its American counterpart, according to Del Monte senior manager Ramon Velez.
According to its website, the company operates the largest integrated pineapple operation in the world, growing pineapples across 20,000ha (49,421 acres) in the Bukidnon region, about 860km (535 miles) southeast of Manila.
One report claims that 20 rebels also took the mobile phones and valuables of employees of packed foods company Dole after setting up a checkpoint in Impasug-ong.
This is the latest in a series of attacks by communist insurgents in the country which rebel spokesman Jorge Madlos claimed were in retaliation for Del Monte's refusal to obey their demand for it to stop expanding its plantations.
Other plantations and growers in the area remain on high alert.
