IS Southeast Asia chief killed in battle

The head of the Islamic State group in Southeast Asia, who figures on the US "most wanted terrorists" list, was killed yesterday in the battle to reclaim a militant-held Philippines city, officials said.

Isnilon Hapilon's reported death came during a final push to end the nearly five-month siege of Marawi, a battle that has claimed more than 1,000 lives and raised fears that IS was seeking to set up a regional base in the southern Philippines.

President Rodrigo Duterte and security analysts say Hapilon has been a key figure in the jihadist outfit's drive to establish a Southeast Asian caliphate as they suffer battlefield defeats in Iraq and Syria.

The military said the long-haired leader was killed in a dawn offensive alongside Omarkhayam Maute, one of two brothers who allied with Hapilon to plot the takeover of the city.

"It's a big deal for us that they were killed," Defence Secretary Delfin Lorenzana told reporters, adding that Hapilon's death was a symbolic blow to regional militancy because he had been declared the local emir of the Islamic State group.

Philippine military chief of staff General Eduardo Ano showed reporters a photo of what he said was Hapilon's bloodied face.

The US government had offered a $5 million bounty for information leading to Hapilon's arrest, describing the 51-year-old as a senior leader of the southern Philippines-based Abu Sayyaf group, which the US considers a "foreign terrorist organisation".

Ano said Philippine ground forces launched an assault before dawn, sparking a four-hour gun battle that lead to the two leaders' deaths.

DNA tests will be carried out on the two bodies because of the reward offer from the US and Philippine governments, Lorenzana said.