Search intensified for 4 men kidnapped in Basilan

COTABATO CITY, Philippines – Policemen and Marines have intensified their pursuit for the armed men suspected to be Abu Sayyaf bandits who seized two Chinese traders and two other men in Maluso, Basilan Tuesday.

Chief Superintendent Paisal Umpa, director of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) police, said officials of towns around Maluso have also joined the search for the kidnappers and their captives, including Chinese traders Michael Tan, 27, and Oscar Lu, 51.

Umpa said ARMM Gov. Datu Zaldy Ampatuan has directed Basilan Gov. Jum Akbar to form a crisis management committee to oversee efforts to secure the release of the captives.

Umpa said Ampatuan has explicitly told Akbar and the Basilan police to strictly adhere to the government’s no-ransom policy in dealing with the kidnappers.

Tan and Lu were inside the fenced compound of a plywood factory in a secluded area in Maluso when the armed men arrived, disarmed militiaman Sakilan Lumayon, who was guarding the establishment, and seized the two businessmen. Lumayon and a worker named Mark Singson were seized, too.

Text messages have been circulating since Tuesday night purporting that the latest kidnapping in Basilan was the handiwork of local forces of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front in retaliation for the Nov. 7 arrest at the Zamboanga City airport of Asnawi Addan Salah, a leader of the MILF’s 114th Base Command.

Salah, who was to leave for Mecca, Saudi Arabia to join this year’s Hajj (pilgrimage) there, was wanted for his alleged involvement in the fatal ambush on July 10, 2007 of 14 Marines in Albarka, Basilan. Ten of the slain Marines were beheaded by their ambushers.

The MILF’s website, www. luwaran.com, said Salah was arrested based on “false” charges.

Umpa said some Basilan officials have already identified those behind the kidnapping in Maluso.

“We have to give our investigators enough time to validate their identities. We cannot point any accusing finger at any particular group or any suspect without sufficient evidence at hand,” he said.

Senior Superintendent Abubakar Tulawi, Basilan police director, though tagged Abu Sayyaf leader Puruji Indama in the abduction. Indama was also tagged in the 2007 beheading of 10 Marines in Basilan. – With Roel Pareño and James Mananghaya