Small bombs hit south Philippines

Police said the bombs were designed to sow fear not cause damage

Two small bombs have exploded outside a Catholic cathedral and a cafe in the southern Philippines, police said.

No one was injured in the blasts, which happened at dawn in Zamboanga City, where US troops helping the Philippines army fight an insurgency are based.

Police officials said they suspected Abu Sayyaf-linked militants might be behind the incidents.

A police official said traces of a mortar round and a mobile phone were found at one of the bomb sites.

'Fear, not damage'

Police have been placed on high alert, but security in the city was already heavy because of a national sports meet.

"Whoever did this apparently did not want to cause real damage, just sow fear," Colonel Darwin Guerra, a local police commander, told Philippines radio.

Another police official said the bomb at the Immaculate Conception Cathedral had been hidden in a box placed under a car.

Abu Sayyaf is the smallest but most radical of the Islamic separatist groups in the southern Philippines.

It gained notoriety for a string of kidnappings of Westerners and Filipinos but has also claimed responsibility for a string of bombings.