Cotabato City, Philippines - A senior Red Cross official urged on Saturday government troops and Muslim guerrillas to spare civilians in the escalating hostilities in the southern Philippines.

Dominik Stillhart, International Committee of the Red Cross deputy director for operations, met Saturday with some of the more than 500,000 civilians displaced in the fighting between soldiers and Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) in the southern region of Mindanao.

"Given the breakdown of the peace process, civilians will continue to suffer the effects of armed conflicts," he said during a press briefing in Cotabato City, 960 kilometres south of Manila.

Stillhart said the clashes between government troops and MILF guerrillas were the worst since 2003.

"Up to half a million people have been affected by the hostilities and tens of thousands of them have had to flee their homes," he said. "We intend to provide assistance and protection to up to 325,000 people between now and the end of the year."

Stillhart called on government forces and MILF guerrillas to comply with the international humanitarian law and he urged combatants to allow and facilitate deliveries of emergency relief and medical supplies to all who need them.

On Friday, the military was verifying a report that MILF guerrillas hijacked a truckload of rice intended for evacuees in Manasapano town in nearby Maguindanao province.

The fighting between soldiers and MILF rebels erupted last month after the Supreme Court stopped government and guerrilla peace negotiators from signing the ancestral domain agreement that would have defined a Muslim homeland in Mindanao.

Two MILF commanders launched series of attacks and seized several towns and villages in the provinces of North Cotabato, Sarangani, Lanao del Norte and Lanao del Sur that killed nearly 200 people, including more than 60 civilians.

Opponents of the ancestral domain deal urged the Supreme Court to declare the agreement unconstitutional. They warned it could lead to the Balkanization of the Philippines, splitting the territory along ethnic or religious lines.

President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo eventually scrapped the deal and on Wednesday dissolved the government peace panel, raising fears of more clashes in the coming days. (dpa)