Sipadan abduction fans fears about militant groups

By Girlie Linao

MANILA (DPA): Fears of an upsurge in "Islamic radicalism" in the southern Philippines and neighboring Muslim-dominated countries were fueled last week when 21 nationals from seven countries were kidnapped from a popular tourist destination island by Filipino Muslim extremists.

Analysts said the kidnapping in the diving island of Sipadan off the coast of Borneo on April 23 was another "desperate" attempt by the Abu Sayyaf guerrilla group to attract international attention.

But security officials warned the continuing hostage crisis has stoked growing apprehensions that the extremist group's main bases in the Philippines could become a first-rate staging or transit ground for international terrorist activities.

With its cross-border abduction from Malaysia, the Abu Sayyaf group now appears to have already established alliances with separatist groups in neighboring Malaysia and Indonesia, the analysts said.

"They obviously extended their evil intent to neighboring countries," said Philippine Defense Secretary Orlando Mercado.

The Abu Sayyaf started as a shadowy insurgent group in 1992, when it attracted young and idealistic Muslim students as well as die-hard combatants ready to give up their lives.

The group was founded as a breakaway unit from two other Muslim rebel groups by charismatic preacher Abdurajak Abubakar Janjalani, a Libyan-trained fighter, who was hailed for his passionate faith and strict adherence to Islam.

Janjalani was killed in a police raid on his hideout in 1998, and his younger brother has since taken over the helm of the Abu Sayyaf.

In a confidential briefing paper obtained by the Deutsche Presse-Agentur, the military warned that the Philippines has "assumed significance to foreign militants as a base, gateway or springboard for their terrorist operations".

The country's geographical location, porous borders, open society, liberal immigration laws, Islamic community and strong ties with the United States are all considered attractive to international terrorists, it said.

The briefing paper noted that local Muslim rebels give foreign militant Islamists "sanctuary and other forms of assistance apparently in return for training, logistics, expertise and access to the international terrorist network".

According to the military, the Abu Sayyaf has strong links with such global fundamentalist groups as Hamas, Hezbollah and those operated by Saudi dissident Osama bin Laden, the suspected mastermind of the 1998 twin bombings of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.

Islamic scholar and former Muslim rebel Usmad Mohammad lamented that Janjalani, from his idealism has "distorted the teachings of the Koran", and fanned the flames of Islamic fundamentalism in the southern region of Mindanao.

"The extremist group has adopted the idiosyncratic revolutionary philosophy of Libya's Moamar Gaddafi, whose call for a revolt against Christianity in 1970s shocked the world," Mohammad said. "They are fanatics."

Philippine officials have in the past dismissed the Abu Sayyaf as a criminal gang of not more than 1,000 young fighters with little capability to sow terror in Mindanao, home to the country's Muslim minority.

But the group joined the big league in 1994, when it raided a predominantly Christian town in Zamboanga del Sur province, killing more than 50 people and razing to the ground various business establishments.

Since then, the group has been blamed for numerous atrocities in the south, including bombings, killings, abductions of foreign missionaries and a plot to assassinate Pope John Paul II during a visit in Manila in 1995.

Political analyst Alex Magno said the Abu Sayyaf's radicalism and desperation make the group more dangerous than other Muslim groups seeking the establishment of a separate Islamic state in Mindanao.

"The terrorists are now nothing more than a band of very desperate men," Magno wrote in a Manila Standard newspaper column. "A band like this is capable of the most bizarre acts."