Gunmen seize five engineers

Gunmen seize five engineers

ISABELA, Philippines (Reuter): Forty gunmen seized five geodetic engineers in the southern Philippines after freeing unharmed three suspected military informants they had abducted earlier, the military said yesterday.

The victims were taken by 40 armed men on Friday from a house in Sumisip town on Basilan island, where they had been conducting a survey for the Department of Agrarian Reform.

The motive for the kidnapping was not immediately known. Earlier, the same armed group freed unharmed three Moslems they suspected of helping government forces locate the hideouts of rebels during an army operation on Basilan, 900 kilometers south of Manila.

The three were released after negotiations between the kidnappers and relatives of the victims, police in the Basilan capital of Isabela said. They said they did not know if any ransom was paid.