Two charged over Philippine blast

President Arroyo visited victims on Monday

Police in the Philippines have charged two people over Sunday's bombings in the southern city of General Santos, in which at least 14 people were killed.

Police said the two, named as Bobby Sabilo and Mulikin Adam Ambi, were Muslim militants.

They have been charged with murder, attempted murder and illegal possesion of explosives.

President Gloria Arroyo has ordered tightened security in the city, though officials clarified that an earlier announcement of a state of emergency had no legal effect.

A woman who lost two children in the blast is comforted

Mrs Arroyo has called the bombings "a crime against the Filipino people".

Police at first alleged that the two suspects were members of a Muslim separatist group, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).

But a MILF spokesman has denied the charge, while another militant group, the Abu Sayyaf, has said it carried out the bombing.

Other suspects at large

Police allege that witnesses saw the two men place something in a tricycle parked outside a busy shopping centre on Sunday.

The tricycle later exploded, killing or wounding dozens of people.

The suspects were arrested in a raid on a house in the city.

Police officers said they found firearms and a hand grenade during the raid.

Police said they were guerrilla group and that they might be connected with the al-Qaeda network.

Several other suspects are still at large, according to the police

Government concern

National police spokesman Senior Superintendent Leonardo Espina told the French news agency AFP that an investigation was underway to see whether the two men were involved in any regional terrorist groups.

He said they were believed to be former Muslim separatist rebels, who had been trained in bomb-making in Malaysia, and were part of a 10-man terrorist cell operating here.

The MILF is the main guerrilla group campaigning for independence for the Muslim minority in the southern Philippines, while the US links Abu Sayyaf with Osama Bin Laden's al-Qaeda network.

Hundreds of US soldiers have been sent to the southern Philippines to train the army in its fight against the Abu Sayyaf.

Last Thursday, an Indonesian man, Fathur Rohman Al-Ghozi, pleaded guilty to explosives possession after providing information that led police to a cache of a ton of explosives in General Santos.

In January, police arrested three Filipinos in town on suspicion of links with Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network.

Correspondents say it is possible that the blasts are linked to the sentencing of Al-Ghozi to a 12-year prison term.