Galvez says the victims were taken to a hospital for treatment and have been declared out of danger.
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In a statement, the DFA said it “regrets” the incident which injured Saudi Islamic scholar Dr. Aid Al-Quarni and Saudi Embassy religious attaché Sheikh Turki Assaegh.
Members of the Police Security and Protection Group, who were detailed as close-in security, were able to kill a suspect.
Qarni was posting on Twitter moments before the attack, saying he was giving a lecture to a large audience.
It said the 57-year-old al-Qarni was removed from his flight from Saudi Arabia despite having a visa from the US Embassy.
Galvez says policemen later arrested two other suspects in connection with the attack.
A uniform for engineering students in the Western Mindanao State University, where Mr Al Qarni was speaking, was found in his backpack, but university officials could not immediately confirm the gunman was enrolled at the institution.
Investigators have yet to determine the motive behind the shooting but Qarni was recently included in an Islamic State hit list.
Although Qarni is not employed by the state, he supports the government and enjoys credibility as an “independent” cleric who once backed an Islamist opposition movement against the Al Saud that led him to be banned from preaching in the early 1990s.
The International Union of Muslim Scholars (IUMS) has condemned an assassination attempt on the renowned Saudi preacher Aaidh Al-Qarni in the Philippines on Tuesday.
Philippine Foreign Undersecretary Rafael Seguis said last week that the Saudi government had asked several countries, including the Philippines, for improved security because of a possible threat, the nature of which was not specified.
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ISIS has been trying to establish links with local armed groups in the southern Philippines, and at least one group – the Abu Sayyaf – has pledged to carry out attacks in its name.
