MANILA, Philippines (AP) – Philippine troops have killed a rebel commander of Abu Sayyaf who has been accused of ransom for years and rescued the last of his four Indonesian prisoners on Sunday, the army said.
Marines wounded Amajan Sahidjuan in an armed wound on Saturday night and he later died of blood loss on Kalupag Island in the southernmost province of Tawi Tawi. Two other militants managed to escape and dragged the last of four Indonesian hostages, but troops finally rescued him on Sunday, regional military commander Lt. Gen. Corleto Vinluan jr. Said.
On Thursday night, three men from Indonesia were rescued by police who also captured one of their Abu Sayyaf prisoners along the shores of the city of Ubaw in Tawi Tawi.
The army said the Abu Sayyaf militants led by Sahidjuan were fleeing assaults in the nearby province of Sulu when their speedboat was hit by big waves and capsized from Tawi Tawi.
A military officer said the militants were trying to cross the sea border into Tambisan Island in neighboring Sabah State, Malaysia, to release the prisoners in exchange for a ransom of at least five million pesos ($ 104,000). , but the Philippine army got the plan planned and launched secret assaults.
The official, who has extensive knowledge of the operations against Abu Sayyaf, spoke to the Associated Press on condition of anonymity due to a lack of authority to speak in public.
Vinluan said the rescue of the Indonesian men, the last hostages detained by the Abu Sayyaf, would enable government forces to complete the ransom rebels.
“It will only be ruthless during a massive and focused military operation, because we will not worry about the abduction of victims,” Vinluan told reporters by telephone.
Vinluan said there were about 80 Abu Sayyaf armed men in Sulu and remote island provinces left. One of their remaining elderly leaders, Radulan Sahiron, fell ill and was wounded in a recent offensive in Sulu, he said.
Sahidjuan, who uses the nom de guerre Apuh Mike, has been blamed for the abduction of ransoms since the early 1990s. He was apparently among Abu Sayyaf militants who attacked the southern Christian city of Ipil in 1995, where they killed more than 50 people after robbing banks and shops and burning down the city center in one of their most arrogant raids.
The Abu Sayyaf is a small but violent group that has been blacklisted separately by the Philippines and the United States as a terrorist organization for bombings, ransoms and beheadings. Some of his factions join the Islamic State group.
The militants have been significantly weakened by years of military attacks, surrenders and setbacks in the fight, but remain a threat to national security. They have set off a security alert in the region in recent years after setting up their forest camps in Sulu, a poverty-stricken Muslim province in the largely Roman Catholic nation, and targeting kidnappings in Malaysian coastal towns and on the crews of cargo ships.