A powerful explosion ripped through three floors of a shopping mall in the heart of Manila's financial district Friday, killing eight people, injuring scores and sending police and troops on the highest state of alert.
President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo said "circumstances indicate it is highly probable that it was caused by an explosive device." Brilliant observation, Ms. Arroyo, who is also paralysed by political correctness, although not quite as bad as our own President Bush and the politicians in the USA. The same mall was targeted by a bombing in 2000. Over 1722 Filipinos have been killed by muslims in the Philippines.
Add now 8 more and we are at 1730 dead. I do not know about there military numbers of casualties, but I am sure its right up there.
Mario Em, a taxi driver, said he had just dropped two women off at the mall when the blast hurled the passengers against his vehicle, killing them instantly. He said he pulled one of the victims, who was pregnant, from underneath his car. "One man who was in front of me was already dead. There was a child, but we don't know where the child is now," said Dennis Inigo, who was shopping at the time. People inside the mall scampered toward the exits when the blast shook the mall. People inside the mall scampered toward the exits when the blast shook the mall. "The man's wife was with me a while ago, and her leg was shattered. Many people were falling on top of each other," he said. "It was loud, and then it became dusty." The shock waves from the blast, which appeared to have originated from a basement entry for delivery vehicles, shot through three floors of the mall as well as sideways. It would have to be that way because in the Philippines, much to their credit, its virtually impossible to enter all shopping centers and malls without security intervention. I was frisked many times when I was there.
Al-Qaida-linked militants, who have waged a years long bloody bombing campaign in the southern Philippines, have targeted Manila before. huh? muslims have been killing Filipinos for over a century, what an understatement,
Makati city Councilor Jejomar Binay Jr. said a bombing at the same mall in May 2000 that wounded 13 people was the work of Muslim extremists. Five months later, five nearly simultaneous bombs around Manila blamed on the al-Qaida-linked Abu Sayyaf and the Jemaah Islamiyah network killed 20 people and wounded about 100 others.
In 2004, Abu Sayyaf militants blew up a passenger ferry in Manila Bay, killing 116 people in the country's worst terrorist attack. The following year, four people were killed and dozens wounded when a bomb exploded on a Makati bus and two southern cities. Several months ago, authorities were alerted to an alleged terror plot to plant bombs in Manila's business districts of Makati and Ortigas, said a government counterterrorism official. The Philippines is in high gear on the global jihadist mentality.
I have nothing but the deepest sorrow for the people of the Philippines. My prayers are with them as they morn there dead.
I have been in Makati and I felt more safe in the Philippines, with all of there security, than I do in the shopping Malls in the USA. I saw police and security everywhere. I love the Philippines its a fun place.
