Government forces in the Philippines have finally cleared and retaken a Catholic church in the centre of the predominantly Muslim city of Marawi after 95 days of fighting there, according to The Philippine Star.
The military said that troops originally took control of St. Mary's Cathedral on Friday, but then had to clear the church of improvised explosive devices left by the Islamist Maute group, which seized the church in Marinaut village during the first day of fighting in the region on May 23.
Captain Jo-Ann Petinglay, the spokesperson of the Joint Task Force Marawi, said troops from the 10th Infantry Battalion approached and took over the church on Friday afternoon.
Back during the first week of the siege, the Maute group posted videos of themselves seizing the church and desecrating religious images inside it. The militant group also seized the priest, Teresito 'Chito' Soganob, along with 10 others.
Petinglay said that after the successful recovery of the cathedral, troops were also able to recover three high-powered firearms and assorted ammunition inside the building.
The move came hours after the troops also retook the Islamic Centre and the Grand Mosque that the Maute group used as a command and control centre.
There, the troops recovered three 'booby traps', a 'suicide bomb suit', two rocket propelled grenade (RPG) launchers, an RPG rocket and a tripod for a machine gun, according to the report. They also recovered the black flag used by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria.
Troops also found a tunnel inside the mosque that the military believes the Maute group used to store ammunition, the report said.
'We have seen how these terrorists have desecrated both the Islamic Centre and the St Mary's Cathedral,' said a senior military official.
'This only shows how these people do not respect any religion, may it be Christian or Muslim,' the official added.
With Christians caught in the crossfire, violence erupted in May after a failed army raid to capture a top militant, Isnilon Hapilon, a leader of the Abu Sayyaf militant group who is on a US terror watch list and has also pledged allegiance to the so-called Islamic State group. The raid failed and dozens of gunmen took to the streets of Marawi, flying black ISIS flags.
