Philippines says seizes lunch-box bombs in south

MANILA, Nov 21 (Reuters) Philippine security forces seized several improvised bombs hidden inside thermos and lunch boxes in a hideout abandoned by Muslim militants on a remote southwestern island, an army spokesman said today.

Major Eugene Batara said experts defused the crude bombs minutes after soldiers stormed a cluster of thatched houses believed to have been hastily abandoned by members of local militant group Abu Sayyaf on Jolo Island.

''We could have disrupted their activities because the rebels left a lot of things in the area,'' Batara said, adding the bombs were not setup as a booby trap.

One of the thermos jugs was stuffed with dynamite sticks, nitric acid and rigged with 4-inch nails while some lunch boxes were found with similar explosives and ball bearings, he added.

''The bombs were electronically triggered and powered by two 9-volt batteries,'' he said, suggesting the rebels were either holding some practical training in bomb-making or making actual explosive devices.

Philippine intelligence officials fear that Islamic militants from neighbouring Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia had been teaching local Muslim rebels how to make sophisticated bombs.

Lunchbox-type explosives have been used in Indonesia by members of Jemaah Islamiah, a regional terror outfit that seeks to create an Islamic ''superstate'' across Southeast Asia.

Since August, about 6,000 Philippine troops, backed by U.S.

military advisors, have been trying to flush out hundreds of Abu Sayyaf and a handful of JI members hiding on Jolo.

REUTERS PDM HT1700