JOINT police and military operatives arrested a suspected member of the Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG) and seized bomb-making components in a raid at an ASG safe house in an east coast village in Zamboanga City.
Senior Superintendent Angelito Casimiro, Zamboanga City police director, identified the arrested ASG member as Salam Arula, a native of Lampinigan Island, Isabela City, Basilan province.
Casimiro said Arula was nabbed around 11:30 a.m. Saturday in Sitio Gapuh, Barangay Talabaan when joint police and military operatives raided the safe house of a notorious ASG member identified only as a certain "Alkobar."
He said Alkobar, who was the primary target of the raid, remained at large since he was not around when the lawmen swooped down the safe house.
Alkobar has standing warrants of arrest for kidnapping and serious illegal detention, murders and frustrated murders for his alleged involvement in the 2001 kidnapping of workers at the Golden Harvest Plantation in the village of Tairan, Lantawan, Basilan province.
Casimiro said the raiding team has also recovered bomb-making components in the vicinity of Alkobar's safe house.