MANILA, Aug. 29 (Xinhua) -- Twelve government soldiers were killed and five others were wounded in a firefight with Abu Sayyaf militants in Sulu Province of southern Philippines Monday afternoon, according to military.
Maj. Filemon Tan, spokesman of the military's Western Mindanao Command, said the latest fighting broke out at around 4:30 pm involving troops from the Army's 35th Infantry Battalion in Patikul town.
Tan said the fighting lasted until around 6 p.m.
He said the clash left undetermined number of casualties on the militants' side.
The military debacle occured after the killing of 21 Abu Sayyaf men in skirmishes with soldiers last Thursday and Saturday also in Patikul town. Seventeen soldiers were wounded in the fighting.
As of press time, Tan said efforts were still underway to extricate the slain and wounded soldiers from the encounter site.
The 400-strong Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG), founded in the early 1990s by Islamic extremists, is a violent terrorist group operating in southern Philippines. The ASG is notorious for a series of kidnappings, bombings and even beheadings in southern Philippines over the past decades.
