{{Fighting between government forces and separatist rebels in the southern Philippines has resumed, witnesses said, as the standoff with the rebels in the city of Zamboanga entered its 10th day.}}
Military officials on Wednesday said that government forces now controlled 70 percent of the areas that had been occupied by the fighters of the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF), who seek an Islamic state in the southern Philippines.
More than a 100 people who were held hostage by the rebels escaped on Tuesday, as the rebels engaged in deadly street battles with Philippine troops. Hundreds of other civilians remain trapped, with some being used as hostages or human shields.
The standoff began last week, when hundreds of MNLF fighters invaded Zamboanga in a bid to derail peace talks.
The military said on Wednesday it had killed more than a hundred rebels, as it retook Santa Barbara and Santa Catalina in the centre of Zamboanga.
There has also been heavy fighting in Talon and Mampang, in the east of the city, but it was not known how many rebels remained there.
wirestory
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