BASILAN, Philippines (Mindanao Examiner / June 13, 2008) – Muslim rebels freed before dawn Friday two marine intelligence they seized in the southern Philippine island of Basilan after a series of government negotiations.
Moro Islamic Liberation Front rebels captured the two soldiers who were trying to negotiate for the surrender of a senior MILF leader in Basilan, where security forces are fighting Abu Sayyaf militants.
The rebels then demanded the military to free an Abu Sayyaf militant, Sali Alih, arrested last week by policemen and soldiers in Basilan’s Lamitan City. Alih was implicated in the beheading of 14 marines in fierce clashes last year in Al-Barka town, also in Basilan.
The soldiers were trying to get rebel Hadji Mas'ud alias Commander Long to surrender to them when gunmen seized them in Tipo-Tipo town.
The military’s Western Mindanao Command said the two soldiers - Corporals Jesse Duatin and Bernard Alcabasa (not Bernard ALcanta as reported by the MILF) – were released without any condition.
“The two soldiers are freed after a successful negotiation led by village leader Raisa Masud in Al-Barka town,” military spokesman Major Eugene Batara told the Mindanao Examiner.
Batara did not give details of the negotiations, but said the Abu Sayyaf prisoner will not be released. “We have laws to follow here,” he said.
He said the operations against the Abu Sayyaf will continue in Basilan island. “The operations against lawlessness will continue,” he said.
Alih belongs to the group of Abu Sayyaf leader Furuji Indama, blamed for the spate of attacks on military patrols in Basilan island.
Alih, a nephew of Mas' ud, was traveling on a motorcycle with another companion when police and military forces captured him. His companion was briefly held, but freed later by the police for lack of evidence to link him to the Abu Sayyaf.
The Abu Sayyaf is a small, but the most dreaded among local Muslim rebel groups in the southern Philippines. Filipino authorities linked the Abu Sayyaf also known as Al-Harakatul al-Islamiya, which means "bear of the sword" to the al-Qaeda terror network and the Indonesian militant group Jemaah Islamiya.
Another faction of the Abu Sayyaf is holding a kidnapped television reporter Ces Drilon and her cameramen Jimmy Encarnacion and their guide Professor Octavio Dinampo, of the Mindanao State University.
One cameraman, Angelo Valderama, was freed late Thursday in Sulu province where militants seized them June 8 in the village of Kulasi in Maimbung town while pursuing an exclusive story about the Abu Sayyaf.
Drilon works for the television giant ABS-CBN Broadcasting Corp. while Dinampo teaches Political Science at the Mindanao State University.
Police have tagged Gafur Jumdail, Albader Parad and Umbra Jumdail, a notorious militant leader wanted both by Washington and Manila for terrorism and killings, as behind the kidnappings. (Mindanao Examiner)
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