Rebel Leader Denies Hand In Kidnap Of Italian Priest In Mindanao

ZAMBOANGA SIBUGAY (Mindanao Examiner / 13 Jun) – The chief suspect in the kidnapping of an Italian priest in the troubled southern Philippines region has denied involvement in the disappearance of Fr. Giancarlo Bossi.

Bossi, of the Pontifical Institute for Foreign Missions, was taken at gunpoint by renegade members of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) on June 10 after celebrating mass in the remote coastal village of Bulawan in Payao town in Zamboanga Sibugay province.

Police and military have tagged the brothers Akiddin and Waning Abdusallam in the kidnapping. The MILF, denying its involvement in the priest’s disappearance, disowned the two men, saying, they are Abu Sayyaf militants whose group is tied to al-Qaeda.

Police said Akiddin Abdusallam is the deputy commander of the MILF’s Bangsamoro Islamic Armed Forces operating in the Zamboanga Peninsula.

Army Major General Nehemias Pajarito, in-charge for the rescue of the missioner, said Akiddin Abdusallam denied any participation in the Bossi’s kidnapping.

“Akiddin Abdusallam has denied any involvement in the kidnapping of the Italian priest. Fr. Bossi. He said he has no participation in the kidnapping. Authorities are investigating this claim,” Pajarito, commander of the First Infantry Division, told the independent regional newspaper, the Mindanao Examiner.

He did not say if Abdusallam, also tagged in previous kidnappings-for-ransom and piracy in Zamboanga, contacted the military or has sent an emissary to deny all the charges against him.

The 57-year old Bossi, from Italy’s Abbiategrasso region, has been described by his PIME superior, Rev. Gianni Sandalo, as a good man. “He is well-loved by everybody. He is a good man and Filipinos call him a gentle giant because of his huge size – he is about two meters tall,” the priest, also an Italian, said in a separate interview in Zamboanga City.

Bossi, who started his missionary in Payao in 1998, is the third Italian priest kidnapped in Zamboanga Peninsula in the past ten years.

Moro rebels kidnapped Fr. Luciano Benedetti, 52, in Zamboanga del Norte province in 1998 and held for nearly 10 weeks until he was freed in exchange for a huge government ransom.

In 2001, renegade MILF rebels snatched Fr. Giuseppe Pierantoni as the 44-year-old from Bologna said mass in the parish church of Dimataling town in Zamboanga del Sur.

The priest was freed after six months in captivity in exchange for an unspecified ransom, but he claimed to have escaped from his kidnappers. His companions claimed he suffered from Stockholm syndrome, a phenomenon in which a hostage begins to identify with and grow sympathetic to his or her captor. (Mindanao Examiner)