The Army's 3 rd Infantry Division aims to simultaneously dismantle the four New People's Army guerilla fronts in Negros island by mid-year of 2009, several months ahead of the target set by President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo to crush them by 2010.

Maj. Gen. Jovenal Narcise, 3 rd ID commanding general, yesterday said they will have to do it at a faster operational tempo, by utilizing all the available troops.

The 303 rd Infantry Brigade, which is spearheading the anti-insurgency campaign in Negros island, is being beefed up by 15 th and 79 th Infantry Battalions from Panay and Bohol .

This will bring to four the number of Army battalions to be deployed in Negros , which Narcise said, form part of their campaign plan to defeat the insurgents by 2010.

Militant groups slammed the government for deploying more troops in Negros , which they said will result in an increase in the number of human rights violations committed by soldiers.

Soldiers of the 79 th IB who came from Bohol arrived Monday at the Dumaguete City Port , for deployment in southern Negros Oriental.

Narcise said the 15 th IB who recently completed the two-month retraining at Camp Macario Peralta in Jamindan, Capiz, is arriving before the end of this month, for deployment in northern Negros.

The Bohol area, which was vacated by the 79 th IB, has already been taken over by an infantry battalion of the Army's 8 th Infantry Division.

Narcise said that after dismantling of the four guerilla fronts in Negros by the middle of 2009, they will concentrate their forces in Panay island for a similar mission.

The 3 rd ID is now recruiting 500 more candidate soldiers to fill up its manpower requirements in Western and Central Visayas .

Narcise also announced the beefing up of 11 th Infantry Battalion of more soldiers, and the scheduled transfer of 302 nd Infantry Brigade headquarters from Carmen, Bohol, to Tanjay City, Negros Oriental.

He said the 15 th and 79 th IB soldiers are well-disciplined troops, who have proven their mettle, while assigned in Antique, northern Iloilo and Bohol .

The military claimed to have dismantled a guerilla front in Cebu, and the remaining cadres and leaders fled to southern Negros in previous years, and re-organized the Komiteng Rehiyon-Sentral Bisayas.*GPB

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