President Rodrigo Duterte, reappearing in public after a week-long absence, said he was deeply saddened by the crisis and promised Marawi would be rebuilt.
He said he had cousins who were members of the Maute group, one of which had been killed, and his decision to declare martial law on Mindanao was justified, because he was aware of exactly what the extremists would do.
"I know the deployment of snipers and where they hid their firearms. I already had the complete picture and I knew that would be a long fight," he said in a speech.
Duterte said he understood why Muslim separatists had fought the government, but could not comprehend Islamic State's radical doctrine.
"What's painful for me, a fractured ideology entered. All that they want is to kill and destroy, how can we live with that?" he said.
