|
Wednesday, September 14, 2005
Troops raid Sayyaf hideout, seize weapons
By Al Jacinto
ZAMBOANGA CITY -- Marine soldiers recovered a small cache of weapons and a speedboat in a raid Tuesday on a hideout of the al Qaeda-linked Abu Sayyaf group in the Province of Sulu, officials said.
Marine spokesman Captain Rommel Abrau said soldiers stormed the group's hideout in the village of Pandan-Pandan in Kalingalang Kaluang town, Sulu Province before sunrise and seized the weapons, mostly machine guns and ammunition.
He said troops also recovered in the village a speedboat with five outboard engines.
"There was no firefight," he said.
It was not immediately known whether the hideout was empty or if its occupants had fled before troops could arrive.
"There is an ongoing operation against the Abu Sayyaf group in Jolo island," Abrau said.
Suspected Abu Sayyaf militants had killed three army soldiers, two of them Muslims, in an ambush in Sulu's Indanan town earlier this month.
The soldiers, onboard a private jeep, were on their way to a mosque to pray when the gunmen ambushed them in the village of Karawan, killing all instantly.
The trio, Aleo said, were members of the army's 53rd Infantry Battalion. The military tagged Abu Sayyaf leader Umbra Jumdail, alias Dr. Abu, as behind the ambush. Troops have been tracking down Jumdail the past weeks in Jolo island.
Last month, soldiers stormed Jumdail's hideout in Indanan's Tarang village, but he escaped along with militant leader Albader Parad.
The duo were among a dozen known Abu Sayyaf leaders wanted by the United States in connection with the killing of kidnapped Californian tourist Guillermo Sobero in 2001 and Kansas missionary Martin Burham in 2002.
Government forces captured early this year Parad and Jumdail's jungle camp in Jolo's Karawan mountain complex after killing and wounding more than three dozen militants in two weeks of fierce fighting.
Authorities blamed the Abu Sayyaf for last month's firebombing of a ferry in Basilan island that killed two persons and wounded more than two dozen others.
The Abu Sayyaf was also implicated in two bombings in Zamboanga City in July that left at least 26 people seriously wounded.
The United States listed the Abu Sayyaf as a foreign terrorist organization. Philippine authorities said the Abu Sayyaf has links with the al-Qaeda and Jemaah Islamiya terror groups.
(September 14, 2005 issue)
Write letter to the editor. Click here.
Join the Sun.Star message board. Click here. |
|
|
|
[return to top]
[home]
|
|
6 Cebu towns ignore audit office's advice