The separatist Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) yesterday vehemently rejected charges that it hosted Hassan Bakre, an Egyptian national who had been arrested in the southern Philippines over alleged links to the Al-Qaeda network. Ameril Umbra, chief of the MILFâs 109th Base Command, said he cannot remember any instance of Bakre visiting the groupâs Camp Omar, âmuch more to taught inside the camp.â
| "Nope. Nope. Never happened." |
âHasan Al-Bakre has nothing to do with the MILF. He is just a simple Egyptian trader framed by the authorities for a still unknown reasons. He is innocent of all those charges,â separatist spokesman Eid Kabalu said in a separate interview.
| "Framed! I tell yez he wuz framed!" |
Earlier in the day, Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) chief of staff Gen. Narciso Abaya said the Egyptian national had confessed to having even fought with MILF members against government troops four years ago. Abaya and other military officials said Hassan trained with other Egyptian and Indonesian militants at the MILF camp. He was said to be a bomb instructor. Abaya said Hassan arrived in the country in 1999 from Malaysia along with six other foreigners. He stayed at theMILFâs main base, Camp Abubakar in Maguindanao province, and later hid in Camp Omar after government troops captured Camp Abubakar in 2000 Abaya said Hassan is also suspected to have have trained some members of the Jemaah Islamiyah, an alleged chapter of the Al-Qaeda in southeast Asia, in demolition.â |