Police on heightened alert in Metro Manila after Sulu bombings

The Philippine National Police said Wednesday its forces were on heightened alert in Metro Manila despite a lack of imminent terror threat there following a double bombing in the southern province of Sulu.

Some 3,200 quarantine checkpoints across the country, police patrols, curfews, and the restriction of unnecessary travel curfews are meant to stop security threats while containing coronavirus infections, said PNP deputy chief for operations Lt. Gen. Guillermo Eleazar.

Bomb-sniffing dogs were also deployed to shopping malls and crowded areas.

“Kasama na po d’yan, hindi lang pagbabantay against virus kundi pati na rin dito sa terror threat na ito,” he told ABS-CBN’s TeleRadyo.

(It’s included there: not just guarding against the virus, but also terror threats.)

He urged the public to make themselves “hard targets” by reporting suspicious people and objects to authorities.

At lease 14 people were killed while dozens were injured when a suicide bomber blew herself up on Monday in Jolo, Sulu's town plaza, while authorities cordoned off the area after a homemade bomb strapped to a motorcycle exploded, investigators earlier said.

Watch Eleazar’s full interview here.

TeleRadyo, Aug. 26, 2020