Cotabato City, Philippines - Two near-simultaneous bomb explosions rocked a southern Philippine town Saturday, but no casualties were reported, a regional army spokesman said.

Lieutenant Colonel Jonathan Ponce said the two explosions occurred a few metres from each other at dawn in Datu Saudi Ampatuan town in Maguindanao province, 960 kilometres south of Manila.

"The site of the explosions is about 10 metres away from the roadside," he said. "It was fortunate that no one was in the area during the attacks."

Ponce said the attacks were perpetrated by Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) rebels in a bid to disrupt a government military offensive in the nearby town of Guindulungan.

On Thursday, nine MILF rebels were killed and five soldiers wounded in fierce clashes in Guindulungan.

"We have already overrun their main camp in Guindulungan," Ponce said. "We seized a lot of improvised explosive devices there."

Ponce added that based on army intelligence reports at least 30 rebels were killed and at least 20 more were injured in the fighting in Guindulungan.

The MILF has been fighting for an independent Islamic state in the southern Philippines since 1978. It has entered into peace talks with the Philippine government in 1997, but the negotiations have been suspended since August 2008 after the rebels launched a series of deadly attacks in Mindanao.

Nearly 300 people have been killed and more than 500,000 were displaced due to the rebel attacks and subsequent fighting with the military.(dpa)