ZAMBOANGA CITY, 13 August 2005 — Police yesterday presented to the media three suspects in the twin bombings that injured 26 people in the southern Philippine port city of Zamboanga.
Adzmar Abduraop, Angon Asmari, and Ibnoyatim Salangin, all in their 30s, were captured hours after a bomb blasted a parked mini-van on Campaner Street in downtown Zamboanga during rush-hours on Wednesday, police said.
The second blast tore through the second floor of a three-story building that houses a restaurant, motel and several shops.
“The three men were positively identified by witnesses, who saw them in Campaner Street minutes before the blast,” local police chief Henry Losanes said at a news conference.
The men were in handcuffs and yellow T-shirts marked ZCPO detainee when presented to reporters and other city officials inside police headquarters.
Security was tight outside the police building.
Officials said the trio were still being investigated.
“The investigation is still going. We would like to know how many or who else are their cohorts,” Losanes said.
The three were not allowed to speak, but police said they were natives of Basilan Island, about 15 nautical miles south of here and is a known stronghold of the Abu Sayyaf group.
Police said a witness saw the trio ran inside a small hotel minutes after the first explosion.
While a second witness claimed he saw one of the three men left a bag, believed to contain the bomb, under the parked vehicle and it exploded later.
Officials did not say what were the motives behind the attacks, but security forces last week arrested an alleged Abu Sayyaf bomb-maker Alex Alvarez, tagged by the military and police as behind the series of explosions in Zamboanga City since 2002.
Intelligence officials believed the latest bombings were in retaliation to his arrest.
