A policeman was wounded in a firefight with suspected members of the New People’s Army (NPA) early on Sunday in a town on Burias Island in Masbate, authorities said.

Elements from the town’s police force and the Philippine National Police’s (PNP) combat unit encountered an undetermined number of suspected rebels while the troops were patroling at the boundary of the villages of Poblacion District 1 and Canomay in Claveria town on Burias Island around 6:30 a.m. Sunday, said Major Angelo Guzman, spokesman of Armed Forces of the Philippines Southern Luzon Command (Solcom), in a statement.

Police Officer 3 Zandro Cabintoy, spokesman of Masbate Provincial Police Office, identified the wounded as PO3 Johnson Osayta, a member of PNP’s 5th Regional Public Safety Battalion.

Cabintoy, reached by phone, said Osayta’s unit was conducting combat operations in the area with elements from the Claveria Municipal Police Station led by Police Senior Inspector Bon Billy Timuat when they clashed with a group of armed men who were also in the area.

Osayta was wounded in the buttocks during the 10-minute firefight, he said.

Osayta underwent emergency treatment at Claveria District Hospital before he was evacuated to the Bicol Regional Training and Teaching Hospital (BRTTH) in Daraga, Albay, he said.

Guzman said Colonel Cesar Idio, commander of the Army’s 903rd Infantry Brigade operating in Masbate, immediately ordered the soldiers to conduct pursuit operation against the escaping rebels.

“The 903rd IB will continue its aggressive conduct of focused military operations and intensify our joint operations with the local PNP and stakeholder” to clear Sorsogon and Masbate of communist rebels, said Guzman. With a report from Delfin Mallari Jr., Inquirer Southern Luzon