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| Southeast Asia | |
| Suspected militant arrested | |
| 2009-09-02 | |
| [Straits Times] POLICE have captured a suspected Al-Qaeda-linked militant accused of high-profile kidnappings of at least four Americans and dozens of Filipinos in the southern Philippines, officials said on Tuesday. Last week's arrest of Hajer Sailani, an alleged member of the Abu Sayyaf, in a shopping mall in southern Cotabato city was the latest success of a crackdown that has netted several militants in the country's south and foiled kidnapping and terror plots, police said. Sailani has been linked to the 2000 kidnapping of American Jeffrey Schilling, a Muslim convert who travelled to an Abu Sayyaf jungle stronghold on southern Jolo Island but was held by the militants on suspicion that he was working for the CIA, police spokesman Leonardo Espina said. Schilling escaped eight months later.
American missionary Gracia Burnham survived the yearlong jungle captivity, but husband Martin was killed in the military rescue in 2002. The third American, Guillermo Sobero, was beheaded by the militants on Basilan Island. Mr Espina said Sailani also played a role in the kidnappings of dozens of teachers, priests and students in two Basilan schools in 2000. Most of the hostages were freed or escaped, but at least two teachers were beheaded. A civilian informant on Tuesday received a US$7,000-dollar reward for the tip leading Sailani's arrest, national police chief Director General Jesus Versoza said. The national police 'will not rest until all terrorists and criminals are arrested, accounted for and neutralised,' Mr Espina said. Among those arrested recently was Dinno-Amor Rosalejos Pareja, alleged head of the Rajah Solaiman Movement that officials say was behind the 2004 Manila ferry bombing that killed 116 people in the country's worst terror attack. | |
| Posted by:Fred |