3 injured in Tacurong passenger bus explosion

(Updated 4:25 p.m.) A 12-year-old boy and two others were injured Wednesday after an explosion ripped a passenger bus in Tacurong City in Sultan Kudarat, the second assault against the transport firm Yellow Bus Lines in less than two weeks. The blast emanated from inside the bus, with body number 15, while it was parked at the poblacion (city center) public terminal. Military and police probers said the assailants used a mobile phone to detonate the bomb, which they described as incendiary explosive devices. The bomb was most likely placed at the back as investigators noted that the bus' rear section was completely destroyed. All 17 passengers had just alighted at the terminal 10 minutes prior to the explosion. The victims were identified as Jerry Castillanes, 23; Eunamae Silva, 17; and Kent Antiquiza, 12, a high school student. They are now undergoing medical treatment at a hospital. Superintendent Joel Limson, chief of the Tacurong police, said that, "A woman was seen by witnesses carrying a black bag and cartoon box. She boarded the bus in nearby Isulan town and then disembarked before the bus reached the terminal." Last July 7, an improvised explosive device hit a Yellow bus (plate LVK-314) in Koronadal City in the same province shortly after the vehicle left the terminal. The bus had just arrived from Surallah town when the explosion happened. Just like the new attack, the passengers had alighted when the blast occurred at about 5:50 p.m. A bystander was reportedly injured. A man, who sported a beard and wore a red shirt, reportedly left a carton box which contained the explosive device. The next day, the South Cotabato police said the Yap family-owned Yellow Bus Line had received extortion threats from a gang led by a certain Alcobar. Yellow buses has been traversing the Davao-General Santos-Koronadal route for years. Meanwhile, Sultan Kudarat Gov. Suharto Mangudadatu said hidden cameras will be set up in populated areas in the province to avert more bombings. Coaches of Weena Bus Lines, which also plies routes in Mindanao, have been the repeated targets of previous bomb attacks. Alcobar had also been eyed as the mastermind of these bombings. Eight people died while more than 15 were wounded in two consecutive blasts which rocked Weena buses in Cotabato City and Bansalan town in Davao del Sur on June 15. A month earlier, another bomb explosion claimed a boy's life and injured over 30 people after a bomb went off near a Weena terminal in Cotabato City. In another attack, 10 people were wounded last June 8 after a blast rocked a North Cotabato terminal of People's Transit Corp., an affiliate of Weena Bus Lines. Bernardo Digoy Baldevieso, embattled Weena Bus company owner, has offered to sell his business since he has grown tired of repeated extortion threats and bomb attacks. - GMANews.TV