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Thursday, March 06, 2008
3 suspected Middle Eastern militants nabbed (7:15 p.m.)
MANILA -- Philippine authorities have arrested three Middle Eastern militants who were suspected to be involved in a plot to bomb the US and three other foreign embassies in Manila, officials said Thursday.
"There is a high probability that they are involved in some kind of plan to sow trouble," Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita told reporters on the sidelines of an annual anti-terrorism and business security conference. All are Middle Eastern nationals.
One of the militants was arrested in Manila and the two others were separately captured in the southern Philippines recently.
Ermita refused to provide details, but two senior Filipino security officials told The Associated Press that investigators were verifying intelligence information that the three may have been involved in an active plot to bomb the US, British, Australian, and Israeli embassies in Manila.
The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media.
Authorities believe the three may have links with the Indonesia-based militant group Jemaah Islamiyah and the Abu Sayyaf, a small but violent southern Philippine-based group blacklisted by Washington as a terror organization. (AP)
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