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| Southeast Asia |
| Captured Filippino JI were on a bombing mission |
| 2005-09-30 |
| The authorities in the southern Philippines arrested four suspected members of the Jemaah Islamiyah militant organization while they were on their way to carry out a bombing mission, officials said Thursday. The capture of the four men followed a week of similar arrests of members of Abu Sayyaf, another insurgent group. Police officials in North Cotabato Province said they had found on one of the men an explosive rigged with a mobile phone as a triggering device. The police said the suspects were in a minibus headed to Cotabato City when apprehended by officers on Wednesday. Terrorists have attacked North Cotabato Province, Cotabato City and other parts of the southern Philippines in the past. Crowded markets and passenger buses were the usual targets. The Associated Press identified one of the suspects as Kasan Datukon, whom the military identified as a bomb expert trained by Jemaah Islamiyah. The group, which originated in Indonesia, has expanded its operations in the Philippines in the past five years, officials said. Major General Agustin Dema-ala, a military commander, said the explosive, which was fashioned from a 60-millimeter mortar, was like those used by Jemaah Islamiyah and Abu Sayyaf in previous attacks. According to Filipino and foreign authorities, Jemaah Islamiyah penetrated groups like Abu Sayyaf and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, the main Muslim separatist group in Mindanao, a major island in the south where most of the country's Muslims live. Filipino and foreign officials had warned this month that Jemaah Islamiyah remained active and could target public places in the capital and other key cities. A military intelligence report said Jemaah Islamiyah had been recruiting more young men, even Christians. Last week, Philippine marines arrested seven alleged members of Abu Sayyaf in Tawi Tawi Province, a group of islands near Malaysia. Also last week, soldiers killed two Abu Sayyaf terrorists during a firefight on the island of Sulu, another Abu Sayyaf refuge. That same week, the Philippine Navy intercepted a cache of explosives and weapons, said to be for Abu Sayyaf. "We have prevented the possibility of a large-scale bombing in the south," said Vice Admiral Ernesto de Leon, the chief of the Philippine Navy. The U.S. National Counterterrorism Center said in a report this month that the Philippines had become a terrorist refuge in the region. The center said it had found that as many as 10 terror groups operated in the country and that there had been 25 terror attacks in the first half of this year alone. |
| Posted by:Dan Darling |