Team Infidel
Forum Spin Doctor
Manila Times
June 27, 2008 By Maricel V. Cruz and Al Jacinto
Muslim rebels in the Philippines have scattered and become leaderless after strikes using US intelligence tips, the Philippines’ military chief said Thursday.
About a dozen leaders of the Abu Sayyaf, a group blamed for the country’s worst terrorist attacks, were killed or arrested in the past seven years after Manila allowed US Special Forces troops to be deployed in southern Mindanao.
Though barred from combat, American advisers have provided intelligence as well as training that helped local troops make headway in counter-terrorist operations, said Gen. Alexander Yano, the chief of staff.
“We have not really confirmed an acknowledged leader [of the Abu Sayyaf],” he told the Foreign Correspondents Association of the Philippines in Manila.
“Some leaders have emerged, but we cannot confirm a single leader [from them] in the stature of [Abu Sayyaf founder Abdurajak] Janjalani who could have welded together the [group] into a united, formidable group,” Yano said.
Bandit arrested
His assertions came as a member of the al-Qaeda-linked group was arrested in Sulu province in Mindanao also on Thursday. Government troops are tracking down there Abu Sayyaf rebels who recently kidnapped a television news crew and their guide in the province.
Army Maj. Eugene Batara, a spokesman for the Western Mindanao Command, said soldiers arrested Jul Akram Hadjail near Sulu’s airport in Jolo, the provincial capital. He added that Hadjail is facing criminal charges in various cases in Sulu and had a P150,000 bounty for his capture.
The Abu Sayyaf, listed by the US State Department as a foreign terrorist organization, has been blamed for kidnappings of Western tourists and Christian missionaries as well as deadly bombings of ferries, shopping malls and buses.
Yano said the terrorist group had become a “loose organization,” and its remaining members, who he estimated to number 360, scattered across the southern islands that are heartland of a longstanding Muslim separatist insurgency.
“The leadership vacuum being experienced now is one of the reasons why they [Abu Sayyaf rebels] have to generate funds” through kidnappings, he added.
The kidnapped local television crew was freed in Sulu earlier this month after at least P5 million (about $112,500) in ransom was paid.
Yano said Filipino troops are conducting “precise surgical moves by specially trained forces that can strike when good intelligence comes in.”
Help from US
He described the role of the US forces in Mindanao as “more of the technical and training.”
“They don’t participate in any combat actions but they assist us in terms of training our forces,” Yano said. “They assist us through some technical equipment, but the actual operations are done by our own forces.”
The help of the US, which has paid bounties for the arrest or killing of Abu Sayyaf leaders, had been significant, the military’s chief of staff said.
“Most of the neutralization of the high-value targets, the high-profile targets that we neutralized in the recent past were effected with assistance from our counterparts [American forces],” he added. “They are a big help.”
He confirmed that the Americans also helped Filipino forces track the kidnappers of the ABS-CBN television team during the nine-day hostage crisis.
Raps against MILF
During the foreign-correspondents forum, Yano announced that the military will file charges against another Muslim rebel group, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, for initiating hostilities on Wednesday in Sarangani province, also in Mindanao. The Armed Forces said a civilian military volunteer, a young girl and a rebel were killed in the clashes.
He stressed the need for the military to reconcile pushing with offensives against the liberation front and guaranteeing the safety of rural folk who are threatened by armed groups.
“We have to strike a very good balance between holding our punches and of course trying to ensure that our plain civilians, civilian communities, are not harmed. So doing this [balancing act] on the ground may not be easy for commanders,” Yano said.
The liberation front accused the military of starting the clashes in Sarangani.
It said its fighters were forced to defend their positions in Ticulab barangay (or village) in Maitum town, after troops from the Army’s 27th Infantry Battalion, Special Action Force and Regional Mobile Group attacked rebel positions in the village.
Maj. Armand Rico, the spokesman for the Eastern Mindanao Command, said the soldiers have to engage the rebels, who had attacked a civilian community.
A ceasefire between the government and the Muslim group is in place as the two sides await resumption of stalled peace talks between them.
--AFP
June 27, 2008 By Maricel V. Cruz and Al Jacinto
Muslim rebels in the Philippines have scattered and become leaderless after strikes using US intelligence tips, the Philippines’ military chief said Thursday.
About a dozen leaders of the Abu Sayyaf, a group blamed for the country’s worst terrorist attacks, were killed or arrested in the past seven years after Manila allowed US Special Forces troops to be deployed in southern Mindanao.
Though barred from combat, American advisers have provided intelligence as well as training that helped local troops make headway in counter-terrorist operations, said Gen. Alexander Yano, the chief of staff.
“We have not really confirmed an acknowledged leader [of the Abu Sayyaf],” he told the Foreign Correspondents Association of the Philippines in Manila.
“Some leaders have emerged, but we cannot confirm a single leader [from them] in the stature of [Abu Sayyaf founder Abdurajak] Janjalani who could have welded together the [group] into a united, formidable group,” Yano said.
Bandit arrested
His assertions came as a member of the al-Qaeda-linked group was arrested in Sulu province in Mindanao also on Thursday. Government troops are tracking down there Abu Sayyaf rebels who recently kidnapped a television news crew and their guide in the province.
Army Maj. Eugene Batara, a spokesman for the Western Mindanao Command, said soldiers arrested Jul Akram Hadjail near Sulu’s airport in Jolo, the provincial capital. He added that Hadjail is facing criminal charges in various cases in Sulu and had a P150,000 bounty for his capture.
The Abu Sayyaf, listed by the US State Department as a foreign terrorist organization, has been blamed for kidnappings of Western tourists and Christian missionaries as well as deadly bombings of ferries, shopping malls and buses.
Yano said the terrorist group had become a “loose organization,” and its remaining members, who he estimated to number 360, scattered across the southern islands that are heartland of a longstanding Muslim separatist insurgency.
“The leadership vacuum being experienced now is one of the reasons why they [Abu Sayyaf rebels] have to generate funds” through kidnappings, he added.
The kidnapped local television crew was freed in Sulu earlier this month after at least P5 million (about $112,500) in ransom was paid.
Yano said Filipino troops are conducting “precise surgical moves by specially trained forces that can strike when good intelligence comes in.”
Help from US
He described the role of the US forces in Mindanao as “more of the technical and training.”
“They don’t participate in any combat actions but they assist us in terms of training our forces,” Yano said. “They assist us through some technical equipment, but the actual operations are done by our own forces.”
The help of the US, which has paid bounties for the arrest or killing of Abu Sayyaf leaders, had been significant, the military’s chief of staff said.
“Most of the neutralization of the high-value targets, the high-profile targets that we neutralized in the recent past were effected with assistance from our counterparts [American forces],” he added. “They are a big help.”
He confirmed that the Americans also helped Filipino forces track the kidnappers of the ABS-CBN television team during the nine-day hostage crisis.
Raps against MILF
During the foreign-correspondents forum, Yano announced that the military will file charges against another Muslim rebel group, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, for initiating hostilities on Wednesday in Sarangani province, also in Mindanao. The Armed Forces said a civilian military volunteer, a young girl and a rebel were killed in the clashes.
He stressed the need for the military to reconcile pushing with offensives against the liberation front and guaranteeing the safety of rural folk who are threatened by armed groups.
“We have to strike a very good balance between holding our punches and of course trying to ensure that our plain civilians, civilian communities, are not harmed. So doing this [balancing act] on the ground may not be easy for commanders,” Yano said.
The liberation front accused the military of starting the clashes in Sarangani.
It said its fighters were forced to defend their positions in Ticulab barangay (or village) in Maitum town, after troops from the Army’s 27th Infantry Battalion, Special Action Force and Regional Mobile Group attacked rebel positions in the village.
Maj. Armand Rico, the spokesman for the Eastern Mindanao Command, said the soldiers have to engage the rebels, who had attacked a civilian community.
A ceasefire between the government and the Muslim group is in place as the two sides await resumption of stalled peace talks between them.
--AFP