Abu Sayyaf frees bank teller

JOLO, Sulu -- Haggard but free, 26-year-old Patrick Viray says Moro guerrillas wished him good luck before dumping him on a highway after three months in captivity.

"I was treated well," the unshaven Allied Bank teller said yesterday, a day after Abu Sayyaf (Father of the Sword) rebels abruptly freed him here.

For part of the time, Viray was kept in a jungle hideout with 21 hostages -- nine Malaysians, three Germans, two French, two South Africans, two Finns, two Filipinos and one Lebanese -- seized two weeks ago at a Malaysian diving resort.

"They are OK, although the old woman is a bit sickly," said Viray, thin but showing no injuries.

He was apparently referring to German Renate Wallert, one of six female hostages among the 21. Wallert, from Gottingen city in northern Germany, was abducted with her husband Werner and son Marc.

Wrenching television footage last Sunday showed Renate Wallert on a makeshift stretcher as mortar shells exploded nearby. Other hostages, looking exhausted and frightened, gathered around her, lifted her head and made her drink out of a plastic bottle.

Lebanese hostage Marie Moarbes said the woman was in urgent need of medical care.

"The urgent thing now is to get the Red Cross and to get her out of here, because she's had at least three strokes in four days and nobody here is a doctor, nobody here can care for her and she's in a very critical situation," Moarbes said in the television footage.

Wearing shorts, a t-shirt and slippers, Viray offered no criticism of his Abu Sayyaf captors who left him on a highway last Sunday. He took a small bus to reach his home in Jolo town, 20 kilometers away.

"We would eat before they ate," he said, speaking from a neighbor's home. "They said 'Good luck' when we parted ways."

Viray's wife, Pinky, said he was released after payment for "board and lodging," a local euphemism for ransom, but she did not specify the amount.

Military intelligence sources said Viray's family paid P200,000. The extremist group earlier had demanded a P2-million ransom.

Abu Sayyaf rebels, led by Commander Robot, snatched him during a cycling holiday with friends in Jolo last Feb. 5. He is the president of the Jolo Cycling Association.

The Abu Sayyaf rebels holding the 21 hostages have not spelled out their demands, but hostages' relatives have said they were seeking ransom.

"They are not only after money," Viray said. "They are fighting for something. They have a cause."

The Abu Sayyaf is one of two groups fighting to carve an independent Muslim state in Mindanao. They have a reputation as a hardened militia.

Last March, Abu Sayyaf rebels captured 29 hostages, mostly school children, on Basilan island near Jolo where the 21 other victims are held.

Fifteen of the Basilan hostages were rescued but four were killed during a military operation, and two others were beheaded. One woman's breasts were cut off. Eight hostages are still being held.

Newspapers said Abu Sayyaf guerrillas beheaded two Army soldiers killed in a clash on Sunday and gouged out the eyes of two others.

Viray, who works for Allied Bank Corp., said he hopes government forces dug in near the guerrillas' hideout in Jolo would not launch a rescue raid.

"I hope there will be no military operation. It will endanger the hostages," he said.

"They (hostages) should be taken out. But that's not for me to say, of course. They (rebels) would have to make that decision."