ZAMBOANGA CITY, Philippines – The Abu Sayyaf has demanded P80-million ransom for a Malaysian trader it is holding captive along with four others in the mountains of Sulu, police said yesterday.
Director Felicisimo Khu, chief of the Directorate for Integrated Police Operation for Western Mindanao, said the ransom is in exchange for the release of Malaysian trader Mohammad Nasarudin Bin Saidin, who was seized by 10 armed men in Indanan town last May 7 while engaged in buying gecko lizards.
Khu did not say when they got the ransom information but quoted intelligence reports that the Abu Sayyaf had supposedly relayed the demand to the Malaysian embassy in Manila.
“This is what our police forces now in Sulu are trying to validate. We are trying to confirm yet the information,” Khu said though.
The Abu Sayyaf group led by a certain Minok Sapari is holding Saidin captive, reports said.
Khu said the kidnappers have brought Saidin and the four other hostages to an undisclosed place in Sulu.
The other captives are Filipino-Chinese Nelson Lim, and three fishing boat crewmen – captain Renato Panisales, assistant engineer Wennie Ferrer, and quartermaster Jonald Ocsimar.
Lim, owner of the Times Hardware and Plaza Panciteria, was snatched last April 29 in Jolo, capital town of Sulu, while the three others, who worked for Mega Fishing Co. based here, were seized off Sulu last March 19.
Khu declined to identify the place where the four remaining captives are being held pending military operations to rescue them.
Brig. Gen. Romeo Tanalgo, chief of the anti-terror Sulu Island Command, said the hostages’ safety is their primary consideration in the rescue operation.
The Sulu provincial government has rejected any negotiations with the Abu Sayyaf kidnappers.