Manila  - Communist rebels raided the house of a town mayor in the eastern Philippines, carting away a shotgun and 12 handheld radios, a regional police spokesman said Wednesday.

Superintendent Eliazar Bron said no one was injured when about 20 heavily armed guerrillas barged into the house of Mayor Helen de Castro of Bulan town in Sorsogon province, 390 kilometres south-east of Manila, on Tuesday.

Bron said government troops have been dispatched to pursue the rebels who fled to nearby mountains.

Communist rebels have been fighting the Philippine government since the late 1960s, making the movement one of the longest-running leftist insurgencies in Asia. (dpa)