Sr. Supt. Melvin Ramon Buenafe, Negros Oriental provincial police director, ordered a thorough probe into the incident.

But he said that initial reports gathered from the field say that the policemen, led by Chief Insp. Julius Muñez, were reacting to a report that there were armed civilians riding in a van in Dumaguete.

The policemen trailed the van and finally caught up with the armed men in Pamplona.

By that time, the armed men had already disarmed the security guards.

When the police accosted them, they said they were NBI agents but they could not show any papers to prove their identities. There was a person whom the NBI sent to coordinate with the police but the incident happened before any coordination could take place, Buenafe

said. "I was told that it was the civilians -- not the police -- who beat up the NBI agents," Buenafe said.*Alex Pal

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