MANILA, Philippines—The Philippine National Police on Tuesday took control of the entire Maguindanao to prevent a possible escalation of hostilities following Monday’s massacre of a group of local politicians, their supporters and journalists.

Chief Superintendent Leonardo Espina, PNP spokesman, said elite police units from the Regional Mobile Group, Special Action Force, Maritime Group and regional police offices of the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao and Central Mindanao were sent to augment police and military forces already in the area.

Espina said numerous police checkpoints and chokepoints were set up around the province to “control the egress and ingress there.”

He said the PNP might also implement a curfew in Maguindanao.

“The physical control (of Maguindanao) will allow us to run (after) the perpetrators as we still are in the stage of preliminary investigation,” he said in a press briefing in Camp Crame, Quezon City.

“We have to restore normalcy. Everybody entering the area is being checked,” Espina added.

As of 3 p.m., Espina said crime scene investigators had recovered 22 bodies, not 24 as earlier reported.

He said 15 of the victims have been identified.

Among the bodies were those of four local journalists who were supposed to cover the filing of candidacy papers of Buluan, Maguindanao Vice Mayor Esmael Mangudadatu.

Espina identified the slain reporters as Marites Cablitas, a General Santos City-based tabloid reporter; Manila Bulletin correspondent Bong Reblando; Rey Merisco of MindaNews; and Sierra News reporter Bienvenido Lagarte.

“As of now, our crime scene investigators are still conducting diggings in the vicinity in an attempt to recover the bodies of other victims,” he said.