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Thursday, February 24, 2005
Officials: Arrested JI suspects planned to bomb church, airport, malls (11:23 a.m.)
MANILA -- Officers have arrested four suspected members of al-Qaida-linked terror groups who were planning to bomb an airport, malls and a church in the Philippines, police officials said Thursday.
Two Indonesians and a Malaysian, all suspected members of the regional Muslim terror group Jemaah Islamiyah, and a Filipino allegedly from the Abu Sayyaf extremist group, were arrested in southern Zamboanga city in December, but their detentions were not announced immediately to allow officials to track their companions, police officials said.
The arrests were to be officially announced later Thursday.
Police intelligence officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the men's targets included a Roman Catholic church and the airport in the bustling port city of Davao and unspecified malls in Manila.
There were other possible targets in the southern cities of General Santos and Cagayan de Oro, they said. Some of the four were arrested at a wharf in Zamboanga after they came off a local ferry, the officials said.
Authorities recovered bomb components, about US$7,000 (euro5,300) and at least two pistols from the four, who were located by police intelligence officials in part due to intelligence provided by Indonesia and Malaysia, the police officials said.
They said the money was intended to finance the bombings as well as possible training organized by Jemaah Islamiyah in the southern region of Mindanao.
The arrests are an indication of continuing collusion between foreign militants and local Muslim radicals. Officials have also been concerned about terror training in the south allegedly set up by Jemaah Islamiyah for foreign and local recruits.
Before the recent arrests, some of the foreigners had been under surveillance and were monitored while they traveled in Mindanao, where they met some Abu Sayyaf members, the officials said.
The four have been charged with illegal possession of explosives and firearms. The foreigners also violated immigration laws, the officials said.
They said the four may have been members of the same Jemaah Islamiyah terror cell responsible for three almost-simultaneous bombings that killed eight people in Manila, General Santos and Davao last week.
Jemaah Islamiyah is blamed for several deadly attacks in Southeast Asia, including bombings on Indonesia's Bali Island in 2002 that killed 202 people.
Authorities also blame the group for a series of bomb attacks in Manila in December 2000 that left 22 people dead.
Philippine security officials say Jemaah Islamiyah has worked with members of Abu Sayyaf, a small but brutal al-Qaida-linked group on a U.S. list of terror organizations, and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, a larger group, which has been fighting for a separate Muslim homeland in the southern Philippines.(AP) |
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