KIDAPAWAN - A local government official was killed and three policemen wounded in an attack by communist rebels in the southern Philippines, officials said Thursday.

About 15 heavily armed members of the communist New People’s Army (NPA) attacked a plantation owned by the Dole fruit company in Makilala town early Thursday, local military spokesman Major Armand Rico said.

He said a jeep carrying three policemen and a village councilor who went to the scene hit a landmine planted by the NPA.

The official was killed and the policemen wounded, said regional police chief Senior Superintendent Lester Camba.

The NPA also destroyed packaging machinery on the plantation before fleeing the area, the military said.

Officials announced earlier this week that more than 700 troops with armored vehicles and artillery have been sent to the southern region of Mindanao in response to the upsurge in NPA attacks on civilian targets.

The NPA, the armed wing of the Communist Party of the Philippines, has been waging a 39-year armed campaign across the country.