Tribal gunmen holding dozens of people captive in a Philippine jungle received a firm warning by the government yesterday as the crisis entered a third day, officials said.
The small group of gunmen raided a school in a small farming village in the Agusan valley region of the southern island of Mindanao on Thursday and took 75 hostages, including children and relatives of their local rivals.
Twenty-eight hostages, including 18 children were later freed.
PHOTO: EPA
“I outlined to them a certain scenario that would happen if they refused to release the remaining hostages,” said local social worker Josefina Bajade, the chief government negotiator in the crisis.
She would not discuss details. Provincial government officials later met the most senior police and military officials of Agusan del Sur Province here to consider their options.
The officials gave no comment but security sources said on condition of anonymity that the use of force to end the crisis could not be ruled out.
About 400 soldiers and police have deployed in the area amid concern that the kidnappers would harm the hostages, who have been forced to sleep on the ground due to the primitive conditions there, according to government officials who visited the area.
The security sources said there were 19 kidnappers armed with assault rifles who were guarding 47 captives held in and around a hut in a clearing of a thickly forested mountain.
They said that while these people had not received formal combat training, they were convinced that the suspects would not hesitate to kill the hostages, noting that some of them have outstanding arrest warrants for clan war-related murders.
“There are 47 hostages still — 45 men and two women,” Santiago Cane, the vice governor of the province who joined the negotiator in her visit to the gunmen’s hideout on Friday, when they also delivered food.
“We will continue to negotiate in the hope of producing results,” he said.
Bajade visited the gunmen’s hideout in a mountainous area early yesterday, but returned grim-faced in mid-morning, having failed to win the release of any more hostages after two successful visits that saw the release of 28 others.
Bajade insisted that the government had not set a deadline.
Authorities have identified the gunmen as members of the Manobo tribe and said the abduction was linked to a long-running clan dispute involving another Manobo family.
Cane said the gunmen’s leader, Ondo Perez, told the negotiator he was willing to end the hostage crisis if the government arrested his local rival Joel Tubay and his armed followers, who the official said also have outstanding arrest warrants for murder.
RARE EVENT: While some cultures have a negative view of eclipses, others see them as a chance to show how people can work together, a scientist said Stargazers across a swathe of the world marveled at a dramatic red “Blood Moon” during a rare total lunar eclipse in the early hours of yesterday morning. The celestial spectacle was visible in the Americas and Pacific and Atlantic oceans, as well as in the westernmost parts of Europe and Africa. The phenomenon happens when the sun, Earth and moon line up, causing our planet to cast a giant shadow across its satellite. But as the Earth’s shadow crept across the moon, it did not entirely blot out its white glow — instead the moon glowed a reddish color. This is because the
DEBT BREAK: Friedrich Merz has vowed to do ‘whatever it takes’ to free up more money for defense and infrastructure at a time of growing geopolitical uncertainty Germany’s likely next leader Friedrich Merz was set yesterday to defend his unprecedented plans to massively ramp up defense and infrastructure spending in the Bundestag as lawmakers begin debating the proposals. Merz unveiled the plans last week, vowing his center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU)/Christian Social Union (CSU) bloc and the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD) — in talks to form a coalition after last month’s elections — would quickly push them through before the end of the current legislature. Fraying Europe-US ties under US President Donald Trump have fueled calls for Germany, long dependent on the US security umbrella, to quickly
Romania’s electoral commission on Saturday excluded a second far-right hopeful, Diana Sosoaca, from May’s presidential election, amid rising tension in the run-up to the May rerun of the poll. Earlier this month, Romania’s Central Electoral Bureau barred Calin Georgescu, an independent who was polling at about 40 percent ahead of the rerun election. Georgescu, a fierce EU and NATO critic, shot to prominence in November last year when he unexpectedly topped a first round of presidential voting. However, Romania’s constitutional court annulled the election after claims of Russian interference and a “massive” social media promotion in his favor. On Saturday, an electoral commission statement
Chinese authorities increased pressure on CK Hutchison Holdings Ltd over its plan to sell its Panama ports stake by sharing a second newspaper commentary attacking the deal. The Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office on Saturday reposted a commentary originally published in Ta Kung Pao, saying the planned sale of the ports by the Hong Kong company had triggered deep concerns among Chinese people and questioned whether the deal was harming China and aiding evil. “Why were so many important ports transferred to ill-intentioned US forces so easily? What kind of political calculations are hidden in the so-called commercial behavior on the
RSS