Intruders launch probing attack on armed forces, High Court told

KOTA KINABALU: Sulu intruders in Lahad Datu launched a probing attack on Malaysian Armed Forces (MAF) conducting a cut-off operation at Kampung Sungai Nyamuk last year, the High Court here heard today.
Major Mingan Yusri Othman said he and his team received instructions to carry out a mopping-up operation at a swampy area at the village where a cut-off team had earlier been attacked.
He explained the mopping-up operation was to force the intruders into the cut-off area where security forces would either apprehend or shoot them if they did not surrender.
Asked by deputy public prosecutor Ishak Mohd Yusof if he knew how the cut-off team was attacked, Mingan said the intruders launched a probing attack to get information on the cut-off team's position.
"Probing attack is a periodic attack by the enemies on the security forces by launching gunshots to find out the security forces' location," he explained.
Mingan said he and 25 men on his team began the mopping-up operation at Kampung Sungai Nyamuk at 7am on March 12, last year. About 10.30am, he said he heard continued gunshots for about two minutes from the direction of a team conducting a cut-off in front.
When the gunshots ended, he and his team moved 2km to merge with the cut-off team from where he heard the gunshots, and were also joined by another cut-off team.
Mingan said after the three teams merged, he and the other team leaders discussed how to take control of the area before them to eliminate the rest of the enemies and take out the body of a man, believed to have been shot dead by one the other two teams.
Thirty people, comprising 27 Filipinos and three local residents, are being tried in the case, in which some are facing multiple charges of being members of a terrorist group or waging war against the Yang di-Pertuan Agong, recruiting members for a terrorist group or willfully harbouring individuals they knew to be members of a terrorist group.
They allegedly committed the offences between Feb 12 and April 10 last year. The hearing before Justice Stephen Chung at the Sabah Prisons Department continues this afternoon. – Bernama