MANILA, Feb 2, (Agencies): The Philippines said it killed three of Southeast Asia’s top Islamic militants in a US-backed airstrike on Thursday, including a Malaysian bombmaker with a $5-million bounty on his head.
The Philippine army, aided by US advisers, launched a pre-dawn bombing raid on a remote southern island in which 15 members of the al-Qaeda-linked Abu Sayyaf and Jemaah Islamiyah organisations died, military chiefs said.
“This is a big victory. There were three senior leaders (killed). This will have a very big impact on the capability of the terrorists,” regional military commander Major General Noel Coballes told reporters in a teleconference.
Planes bombed the outskirts of a village on Jolo island where intelligence sources had informed the military that about 30 militant figures were based, Coballes said, adding no ground troops were initially deployed.
Among those the military said it killed was Zulkifli bin Abdul Hir, alias Marwan, a Malaysian who is accused of being a senior member of regional terror network Jemaah Islamiyah and behind multiple bomb attacks in the Philippines.
He is also accused of being the leader of Kumpulan Mujahidin Malaysia, a Malaysian group that like Jemaah Islamiyah wants to set up an Islamic state across Southeast Asia.
In 2007 the US government offered a $5-million reward for his capture, making him one of the United States’ most-wanted men.
According to the US State Department’s website that posts information about its most-wanted for terrorism, only four people have higher bounties for their capture, among them al-Qaeda chief Ayman al-Zawahiri.
In Malaysia, authorities celebrated the reports of Zulkifli’s death.
“We welcome the news of his demise as security forces in the region continue their fight against such militants,” Ayob Khan Mydin Pitchay, head of Malaysia’s special task force on counter-terrorism, told AFP.
The Philippine military said among the others to die in the air raid was Filipino Abu Pula, also known as Doctor Abu and Umbra Jumdail, one of the core leaders of the Abu Sayyaf militant organisation.
Terrorist
The Abu Sayyaf is blamed for the worst terrorist attacks in the Philippines including the bombing of a ferry in Manila that killed more than 100 people, as well as dozens of kidnappings in the remote, Muslim-populated south.
The third senior militant figure that the Philippine military said it killed was Singaporean Mohammad Ali, alias Muawiyah, another top name in Jemaah Islamiyah.
Jemaah Islamiyah is accused of carrying out many deadly attacks in Southeast Asia including the bombing of tourist spots on the Indonesian island of Bali in 2002 that killed 202 people, among them 88 Australians.
Muawiyah and Zulkifli were believed to have been hiding out on the Abu Sayyaf’s bases on remote, jungle-infested southern Philippine islands since 2003, according to the Filipino military and the US State Department website.
Meanwhile, Philippine authorities said Thursday they had failed to find two European birdwatchers in the crucial 24 hours after their abduction and warned Islamic militants may be holding them.
Hundreds of Marines joined the search for Swiss Lorenzo Vinciguerra, 47, and Dutchman Ewold Horn, 52, who were seized by armed men on the remote Tawi Tawi archipelago in the lawless south of the country on Wednesday.
“There is a massive search-and-rescue operation right now to find the kidnappers and their captives,” regional military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Randolph Cabangbang told AFP.
“Though, as of the moment, we have not pinpointed their exact location.”
Cabangbang said one of the groups that may be involved in the abductions was the al-Qaeda-linked Abu Sayyaf, which is blamed for a spate of other kidnappings of foreigners in the south.
He said the navy was trying to block routes leading to Jolo, an Abu Sayyaf stronghold near Tawi Tawi where an army air raid on Thursday morning left 15 militants dead, including one of Southeast Asia’s most wanted men.
Cabangbang said the first 24 hours were crucial in deciding the fate of people kidnapped in the area because this was when they were typically taken into the abductors’ rugged jungle lairs on remote islands.
Trail
“If the trail goes cold, the chances of recovering them swiftly will vanish little by little,” he said.
At least 10 other foreigners have been kidnapped in the south since the middle of 2010, in what is largely a ransom business with Abu Sayyaf and other militants demanding huge amounts of money for their captives’ release.
Five of those kidnapped — an Australian, two Malaysian traders, an Indian married to a Filipina and a Japanese man — remain in captivity.
The military said some of those hostages were believed to be on Jolo, but their fate after Thursday’s bombing raid was unknown.
In related news, as his kidnappers took him in a speeding boat toward a notorious militant stronghold in the southern Philippines, Ivan Sarenas decided that he would die if he didn’t try to escape. When he saw some fishermen, he took his chance, diving deep and hoping his armed captors wouldn’t shoot.
The Filipino wildlife photographer, seized with two European tourists during a bird-watching trip, escaped Wednesday and spoke to The Associated Press on Thursday. The tourists Sarenas was guiding, Dutch Ewold Horn and Swiss Lorenzo Vinciguerra, remain missing.
“I am still traumatized,” Sarenas said. “I have guilt and concern for the welfare of my companions.”
Sarenas said he, Horn and Vinciguerra arrived in Tawi-Tawi, the Philippines’ southernmost province, on Sunday in search of the Sulu hornbill, said to be the most endangered hornbill in the world.
Tawi-Tawi is famed for virgin beaches surrounded by crystal blue waters but, like the most of the restive southern Philippines, it is undeveloped for tourism because of years of violence, including ransom kidnappings, bomb attacks and fighting between troops and Muslim rebels.
After spending three days in a mountain forest, the three were heading back to the provincial capital of Bongao by boat Wednesday when five rifle-toting gunmen on another boat fired warning shots and intercepted them, Sarenas said.
They were transferred to another boat, then a third boat. About two hours later, about 2:30 pm Wednesday, Sarenas decided to jump over after he realized they were being taken north, in the direction of Jolo Island in the adjacent Sulu archipelago, the stronghold of the brutal Abu Sayyaf group.
“My assumption was we were heading to Jolo. That’s why I became scared because my life would be worthless once I reach Jolo,” he said, recalling reports of the militants’ atrocities, including beheadings of hostages.
He said he informed Horn and Vinciguerra of his plan. “They said, ‘Go. Good luck,’” he said.
He got his chance when they were about 700 yards (meters) from the shore. He saw three small boats with fishermen. He said he gambled that the gunmen wouldn’t shoot him with so many witnesses around.
He removed a tarpaulin cover over him and his companions. An M16 rifle fitted with a grenade launcher was lying on the boat’s floor; he held the muzzle to prevent the weapon from being pointed at him. Then he said he quickly rolled over to the side of the boat.
“I made a deep dive because I was afraid they would shoot me,” said Sarenas, a triathlete.
The kidnappers did not fire and left him in the waters where fishermen soon rescued him. He was brought to a village in Languyan township and later to a police station.
Sarenas said Vinciguerra worked as a taxidermist for a museum in Switzerland and Horn as a freelance taxidermist.
“Some of the birds they have mounted they wanted to see in the wild,” Sarenas said.
Muslim insurgents have been fighting for minority self-rule in the predominantly Christian nation’s south, and the Abu Sayyaf is the most violent group. The militants have been holding an Australian man abducted in December, as well as a Japanese and a Malaysian.
Tawi-Tawi Gov Sadikul Sahali said the birdwatchers were accompanied by a town councilman and an unarmed police officer because the foreigners refused armed escorts.
After seizing them, the gunmen ordered the councilman, the policeman and the skipper out of the boat before escaping with their captives.