MANILA, Oct. 5 (Xinhuanet) -- The Armed Forces of the Philippines(AFP) Tuesday belittled the threat of the rebel group, the New People's Army (NPA), to step up attacks against "isolate" posts ofthe military and police establishments.

    "They would like to portray that they are strong, but the situation on the grounds says otherwise," said AFP spokesman Daniel Lucero.

    The NPA's spokesman Gregorio "Ka Roger" Rosal on Monday said on its website that the group would "launch bigger, more numerous and more frequent tactical offensives on isolated elements of the reactionary armed forces and police every time the opportunity presents itself."

    "The New People's Army pledges to do its utmost to further advance its tactical offensives (TO) and launch bigger and more numerous TOs nationwide," Rosal said.

    However, Lucero said that the military is more than capable of preempting any attacks by the rebels as evidenced by the "tactical victories" the military scored against the NPA for the past several days.

    "We are prepared and we have trained our people enough. We havethe sufficient armaments and training," he added. Nevertheless, Lucero appealed for more public and government support to weed out the insurgency problem.

    "What we are pushing for is for a full cooperation of ourgovernment agencies because we believe this is not just a military problem, we believe that this is also apolitical, economic, and asocial problem which should be answered by all agencies of the government," he said.

    As of June, the military said, the NPA has about 8,500 men withat least 6,200 firearms.

    On reports that the NPA strength is on the rise, Lucero said: "We would also like to belie that their strength is growing. Actually, as early as 2002, we have arrested the growth of the NPA."

    Lucero attributed the declining number of NPA members to thehelp being provided by the populace. "We could have not done thisif not for the support of the Filipino nation, particularly those residents who are living in far-flung areas," he said. The rebel group suffered several setbacks in past weeks.About two weeks ago, nine NPA members were killed following aclash with Army forces in Compostela Valley of the southern islands of Mindanao.

    Last Sunday, another clash occurred in the same town between the two forces, resulting in the killing of three NPA rebels, who,as the military said, attempted to attack police detachments in the area.

    As a response, NPA rebels last week staged three ambuscades inDavao Oriental, Cagayan Valley and Palawan, resulting in the killing of four policemen, two soldiers and a civilian, and theinjuring of four other soldiers.

    A fresh round of negotiations between the Philippine governmentand the NPA political wing, the National Democratic Front (NDF),in Norway in August did not push through due to the NDF's apparent dissatisfaction with the government efforts to remove the NPA fromthe list of terrorist groups of the United States and the European Union. Enditem