ZAMBOANGA CITY, 21 March 2004 — Military officials paraded yesterday a captured Abu Sayyaf militant in this southern port city, as security forces continued to hunt down members of the Al-Qaeda-linked terrorist group blamed for the series of kidnappings and killings in the strife-torn region.
Soldiers escorted Michael Pajiji when he was presented to reporters inside the tightly guarded Southern Command headquarters, four days after his capture in Jolo Island, a traditional stronghold of the Abu Sayyaf group.
Pajiji, who is facing a string of kidnapping and murder charges in Jolo, was captured after marine soldiers stormed a rebel hideout in Kajatian village in Indanan town, said a Southern Command spokesman Lt. Col. Renoir Pascua. “Troops captured Pajiji after civilians provided information about him,” he told the Arab News.
The rebel had a 150,000-peso ($2,664) bounty on his head.
Pascua said the military interrogated the rebel since his capture in an effort to track down other members of the Abu Sayyaf in Jolo. “We used him to hunt down his companions still hiding in Jolo, that is why we did not immediately present him to reporters,” he said.
The military implicated Pajiji in the 2000 kidnapping of 21 mostly Asian and European holiday-makers in the island resort of Sipadan, off Sabah, Malaysia.
“Pajiji is a member of the group of Commander Galib Andang, who was captured in December in Jolo,” Pascua said.
Security forces captured Andang in December.
