Rebels seize U.N. food supply in Philippine south

MANILA (Reuters) - Philippine Muslim guerrillas halted a United Nations convoy and seized food supplies intended for tens of thousands of people displaced by weeks of fighting on a southern island, police said on Friday.

Joel Goltiao, regional police chief, said 20 rebels from the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) stopped on Tuesday a convoy of trucks sent by the U.N. World Food Program near a marshland area on Mindanao and took about 60 bags of rice.

"The rebels ordered the aid workers, at gunpoint, to transfer the shipment of food," Goltiao said, adding the convoy initially thought the armed men on uniform were soldiers manning a checkpoint.

A spokeswoman from the World Food Program told Reuters they were informed by the police about the incident, but the U.N. agency was still checking with its staff what really happened to the convoy.

In a statement late on Thursday, the U.N. agencies said they remained committed to provide humanitarian relief assistance to conflict-affected communities in the south after another convoy was turned back by soldiers in another area last week for its failure to coordinate the food shipment.

Describing it as an isolated case, the U.N. said in a statement it "has not experienced any difficulties or challenges in delivering food to the distribution centers".

Since August 11, the U.N. agencies had distributed more than 1,200 metric tons of rice to more than half a million people displaced by weeks of fighting in six southern provinces.

More than 200 people, including an estimated 125 guerrillas, had been killed in fighting between security forces and rogue members of the MILF after the recent setbacks in peace talks to end nearly 40 years of conflict in the south.

More than 120,000 people had died and 2 million displaced in a conflict that has scared away potential investors to the poor region believed to be sitting on huge deposits of minerals, oil and gas in the south of the mainly Catholic state.

On Wednesday, Manila said it has decided to end 11 years of peace negotiations with MILF after the rebels failed to stop two of their field commanders from attacking Christian-dominated villages, killing civilians and burning homes and farms.

But the government does not expect a spike in violence even after its ended negotiations with MILF, saying it would instead consult communities in the south directly regarding the Muslim problem.

(Reporting by Manny Mogato; Editing by David Fox)