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Police say head of Philippine ‘terror’ group arrested

Suspected terrorist leader Dino Amor Pareja shouts “Allahu Akbar” while being escorted to a police detention cell in Camp Crame, Quezon City, Philippines, yesterday. PHOTO: REUTERS

Police said yesterday they had arrested the head of a group of Islamist militants behind a deadly bombing in the Philippine capital, who also plotted attacks against US targets.

Dino Amor Pareja, the leader of the Rajah Solaiman Movement, a group of Christians who had converted to become Islamic militants, was captured at his hideout in the southern city of Marawi on Friday, national police chief Edgardo Verzosa told a news conference.

Verzosa said the US Department of Defense had offered a US$90,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of the suspect.

An unnamed informant received a separate 500,000 pesos (US$10,000) reward for the arrest, he said.

The police chief described Pareja as a skilled bomb-maker who was trained by Dulmatin and Umar Patek, both Jemaah Islamiyah militants who fled Indonesia to the Philippines to escape prosecution for the deadly 2002 Bali bombings.

Also known as Khalil Pareja, Abu Jihad and Al-Luzoni, the suspect is to stand trial in connection with a 2005 bombing in the Philippines’ financial district that claimed three lives.

He will also be tried for a second blast in the southern port of Zamboanga that wounded 26 people, and a 2005 attack on a Philippine army detachment that left 10 soldiers dead.

The same year Pareja took part in a “failed bombing operation” codenamed “Big Bang” that targeted Manila establishments frequented by Americans and other foreigners, Verzosa said.

In March 2005 the authorities raided a Rajah Solaiman safehouse in northern Manila and seized about 600kg of explosives intended for that campaign, he said.

Pareja also scouted bombing targets in the central city of Cebu in 2006 for attacks planned to coincide with an ASEAN summit, Verzosa said.

Manila called off that leaders’ meeting at the last moment, citing an approaching typhoon.
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