Police have disrupted plots by Muslim militants to bomb tourist and shopping locations in the volatile southern Philippines with the arrests of seven suspects, officials said yesterday.
Police deputy director Avelino Razon identified those detained as operatives of the al-Qaeda-linked Abu Sayyaf group and the Indonesian-based Jemaah Islamiyah who were suspected of plotting attacks to divert attention from an ongoing military offensive against militants on Basilan and Jolo islands.
The arrests included three suspected Abu Sayyaf bomb experts on southwestern Palawan island, a resort province and popular tourist destination northwest of Basilan and Jolo.
Some of the seven detained were armed with explosives.
Razon said the suspects told interrogators they had assembled four improvised explosive devices, one of which was recovered on Sunday near a mosque in Puerto Princesa, Palawan's provincial capital. The three other devices have not been found, he said.
One of those arrested, Omar Jakarain, also known as Abu Moguera, was wanted for his involvement in the 2001 kidnapping of American and other tourists from Palawan's Dos Palmas resort. That yearlong kidnapping saga left several hostages dead, including two Americans.
Military chief Hermogenes Esperon said Moguera was a member of a terror cell connected with Jemaah Islamiyah fugitive Dulmatin, who has been evading a US-backed offensive in the southern Philippines since fleeing Indonesia shortly after the 2002 bombings on Bali.
Moguera was arrested with two other people. Police raided the house of another Abu Sayyaf suspect in Puerto Princesa on Sunday, and apprehended two more people amid fears that terrorists may target the city hall, public markets and beach resorts.
Another man was caught in General Santos city on Saturday, on Mindanao, carrying a homemade bomb he allegedly planned to set off inside a shopping mall, a top police official said.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese