Communist rebel leader captured in Philippines

MANILA (AP) - Philippine troops have captured a senior communist rebel leader who had received military training in Libya and carried a S$166,000 bounty. Regional military spokesman Col. Generoso Bolina says New People's Army regional chief Benjamin Mendoza and three other suspected insurgents were arrested in the early hours of Saturday outside their hideout in suburban Quezon City. He says Mendoza underwent commando, heavy weapons, bomb-making and sniper training in Libya in the early 1980s. Bolina says Mendoza planned several successful raids and ambushes against soldiers and police. In one raid, New People's Army guerrillas freed nine detained rebels from a jail in Batangas province south of Manila.