Philippine troops arrest leader of Abu Sayyaf group
Philippine troops arrest leader of Abu Sayyaf group
MANILA (Agencies): Philippine troops have arrested a senior
officer of the Abu Sayyaf, the Muslim rebel group holding U.S.
and Filipino hostages in the south of the country, government
officials said on Monday.
The military presented at a news conference a handcuffed
Nadzmi Sabdulla, alias Commander Global, or Al Shariff, who they
said was arrested on Sunday with three other Abu Sayyaf members
in the southern city of General Santos.
"The capture of Commander Global...is a great setback for the
ASG (Abu Sayyaf) group," army chief Lt. Gen. Jaime de los Santos
told a news conference.
"I think with this capture, we expect to get further
information on their operations," he said.
The 40-year old Sabdulla, who bowed his head throughout the
news conference carried live on national television, is the
highest-ranking Abu Sayyaf member ever arrested.
Sabdulla's faction is different from the group which abducted
17 Filipinos and three Americans from a tourist resort off
Palawan island on May 27 and took them to Basilan island.
The gunmen have freed most of their captives, after payment of
ransoms, but took more Filipino hostages on Basilan. They have
also beheaded four of their Filipino captives and claim to have
beheaded one of the American tourists.
Planner
Military officers described Sabdulla as the brains of the Abu
Sayyaf group.
"He plans everything for the Abu Sayyaf. The other commanders
of the group are executioners of his plan," Lt. Col. Danilo
Servando, spokesman of the military in the southern Philippines,
told reporters in Zamboanga City.
Sabdulla was one of the commanders on Jolo island involved in
the abduction last year of 21 people, including several Western
tourists, from a Malaysian resort, a police report said.
Police said Sabdulla acted as spokesman for the Abu Sayyaf
during negotiations with the government under then president
Joseph Estrada. Most of the tourists were released after ransoms
of up to $1 million each were paid. Some of them escaped.
On May 27, an Abu Sayyaf faction raided a beach resort off the
western province of Palawan and snatched 20 hostages, including
three Americans. Two Americans and 19 Filipinos, including those
from other abductions remain in the rebels' hands in the southern
island of Basilan.
Armed forces spokesman Brig. Gen. Edilberto Adan said Sabdulla
could have been plotting to stage bombings in General Santos to
divert military attention from Basilan, where four Filipino
captives have been beheaded and 13 freed after allegedly paying
ransoms.
"We are interrogating him now about their widening operation,"
Adan said.
An official police report in Manila identified the other
suspects as Saltima Salih, Halik Sabdani and a certain Javier
Sampang alias Abu Kahir, all from Jolo.
Adan said Sabdulla's group was involved in a foiled attempt on
May 22 to abduct tourists from the Pearl Farm beach resort on
southern Samal Island.
Reward
Manila has offered a five million peso ($94,340) reward for
information leading to the arrest of Abu Sayyaf commanders,
including Sabdulla, and one million pesos for each member.
Adan said the informant who tipped government troops off to
the whereabouts of Sabdulla stood to get a five million pesos
reward.
"We see it as another indication that the Abu Sayyaf network
is being gradually, but surely dismantled. In fact, we see that
we're turning the corner now in the fight against the Abu
Sayyaf," presidential spokesman Rigoberto Tiglao told reporters.
The Abu Sayyaf, with an estimated force of about 1,000, is one
of two groups demanding a Muslim homeland in the south of the
mainly Roman Catholic Philippines. But it does little to fight
for its professed goals and appears to concentrate on kidnapping.