Pangasinan Today

Authorities defused a bomb planted in a bus station in North Cotabato province on Thursday, just days after the end of brutal clashes between Muslim rebels and government forces in the area.

The military said the bomb was found before dawn in abandoned baggage at a bus station in the town of Kidapawan town in Mindanao island. It was made of TNT, a mortar shell and a blasting cap, and was surrounded by nails.

No one has claimed responsibility for the bomb, which was found a few days after hundreds of Moro Islamic Liberation Front rebels began to retreat from areas near Kidapawan following a major military offensive against them.

Muslim criminal gangs have bombed buses and bus terminals in the southern Philippines in the past to extort money from bus companies.