Another extortion gang eyed in Tacurong blasts

KORONADAL CITY, Philippines – The Sultan Kudarat police has tagged another extortion syndicate as behind the bomb attacks in Tacurong City last week.

Senior Superintendent Rolen Balquin, Sultan Kudarat police director, said an arrested suspect, Abdulrachman Usman, a ranking member of the Abu Sulayman group, another extortion syndicate operating in Central Mindanao, confessed that he was instructed by a certain Taib to bring bombs to Tacurong City.

Usman was nabbed a few hours after an improvised bomb went off on the roadside in Barangay New Carmen last Nov. 15.

The Abu Sulayman is believed to have links with the Al-Khobar extortion syndicate that preys on bus firms in the region.