ZAMBOANGA CITY, 15 May 2005 — At least 7 members of the Al-Qaeda-linked Abu Sayyaf group, including two subleaders, were killed in a clash yesterday with government soldiers in Jolo island in the southern Philippines, officials said.
Officials said the fighting erupted in the hinterland village of Latih in Patikul town when marine soldiers ran into a group of Abu Sayyaf gunmen. Two soldiers were also wounded in the clash, officials said.
“At least seven Abu Sayyaf members were killed and two of my soldiers are slightly wounded in the fighting. Operation is going in in the mountain where the terrorists are hiding,” said the commander of the military’s anti-terror Task Force Comet, Brig.Gen. Alexander Aleo told Arab News.
Aleo said they troops clashed with the group of Radulan Sahiron, one of five known Abu Sayyaf leaders wanted by the United Stated for the kidnapping and killings of two American hostages in 2002.
It was not immediately known if Sahiron was wounded or killed in the fighting, Aleo said. “Security forces are still pursuing Abu Sayyaf terrorists who retreated in Patikul,” he said.
A spokesman for the Philippine Marines, Capt. Rommel Abrau, said among those killed were Abu Sayyaf subleaders Mihadon Arok and Abri, who were involved in the kidnapping of 21 mostly European and Asian holidaymakers from the Malaysian island resort of Sipadan in 2000.
“Mihadon and Arok are now gone,” he said.
Lt. Gen. Alberto Braganza, chief of military forces in Mindanao, yesterday ordered troops in Jolo island to intensify their operation against the Abu Sayyaf group, blamed for the spate of attacks on security and civilian targets. “There is no way out but for the terrorists to surrender,” he said by phone in Zamboanga City.
The United States last month lauded the Philippines for its efforts in fighting terrorism and cited the country’s arrest of senior members of the al-Qaeda-link Abu Sayyaf group and Jemaah Islamiya terrorists.
A US State Department’s latest report on global terrorism cited the capture of dozens of suspected terrorists in the Philippines and said it is among the countries in the East Asia-Pacific region whose fight against terrorism has “matured beyond arrests towards prosecution.”
The report said the multi-agency Anti-Terrorism Task Force created by President |Arroyo last year has arrested more than 60 suspected terrorists, including leader Galib Andang, wanted by the United States for his role in the kidnappings of a Kansas missionary couple Martin and Gracia Burnham, and Californian Guillermo Sobero in 2001. And Filipino courts sentenced at least 17 Abu Sayyaf terrorists to death.
Washington listed the Abu Sayyaf as a foreign terrorist organization after Manila implicated five of the group’s known leaders to the killing of Guillermo Sobero and Martin Burnham in 2002. The US offered as much as five million dollars for the arrest of Abu Sayyaf chieftain Khadaffy Janjalani and several other leaders and Manila also doubled its reward from five million to ten million pesos for their capture.
The US Department of Defense’s Rewards Program paid $24,800 to two Filipino informants for their role in the capture of Andang, while 3 other informants received $1 million rewards for their role in the attempted capture of a second Abu Sayyaf leader Hamsiraji Sali in Basilan last year, during which Sali was killed.
Focusing on the Philippines, the Country Reports on Terrorism released on April 27, said both Washington and Manila are working closely to energize rewards programs targeting terrorist groups.
