Kidnappers free retired soldier’s son

NORTH COTABATO, Philippines – Kidnappers released before dawn yesterday a teenage son of a retired Army sergeant who they snatched last Aug. 10 in Midsayap town.

Senior Superintendent Danilo Peralta, North Cotabato police director, said 19-year-old Mark Anthony Baya was freed by his captors to negotiators somewhere in Cotabato City at around 2:20 a.m. yesterday.

Peralta, however, declined to comment if Baya’s family paid ransom in exchange for his release

Baya, a college student, was about to close his family’s small roadside store in Barangay Tumbras, a farming district in Midsayap town, on the night of Aug. 10 when five armed men arrived and dragged him into a car.

Baya was then brought to the swampy border of Midsayap and Datu Piang town in the second district of Maguindanao.

North Cotabato Gov. Emmylou Taliño-Mendoza said Baya was released through the intercession of local Moro leaders and provincial board members Dulia Sultan and Kelly Antao.

The negotiations were also coordinated with the joint ceasefire committee of the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, Mendoza said. – John Unson, Jaime Laude