Troops, kidnappers turn to mind games in
Philippines hostage island
JOLO, Philippines, Oct 5 (AFP)
- Philippine troops and Muslim guerrillas holding five hostages have resorted to
psychological warfare in this southern island, residents and officials said Thursday.
With no targets to bomb, air
force helicopters instead dropped thousands of dollar-bill-sized pamphlets on known Abu
Sayyaf hideouts across Jolo, urging the kidnappers to surrender.
Some leaflets showed an armed
guerrilla carrying a rucksack full of dollars and staring down the barrel of a big gun
along with a written warning: "You have nowhere to hide. Death is nigh. Think about
it while there is still time."
Others carried a similar
message and showed a caricature of a soldier wringing the neck of an Abu Sayyaf gunman.
Meanwhile, Abu Sayyaf leader
Galib Andang accused the government's chief hostage negotiator of taking the lion's share
of the millions of dollars in ransoms the group raised from a five-month kidnapping spree.
Andang's charge was made public
by a former hostage -- one of 12 Christian preachers freed this week.
Chief negotiator Roberto
Aventajado said Thursday that the preacher who spread the allegation "that I earned a
windfall from the negotiations" had since apologized.
He said on DZXL radio in Manila
that the preachers appeared to suffer from "Stockholm Syndrome", a psychological
condition in which kidnap victims take sides with their captors, because they
"allowed themselves to be used by the bandits."
Officials have admitted that
the 1,200-member guerrilla force has vanished in the jungle, frustrating the 5,000
soldiers and police sent to rescue Malaysians Kan Wei Chong, Joseph Ongkinoh and Mohamed
Noor Sulaiman, Filipino Rolando Ullah and American Jeffrey Schilling.
President Joseph Estrada sent
the army into Jolo 20 days ago to rescue the hostages. The assault forced the gunmen on
Monday to ditch 12 the Filipino Christian evangelists who were deemed to be hindering
their flight. Two French captives also cut loose on September 19, taking advantage of the
bombing which forced the gunmen to move camp every night.
University of the Philippines
political scientist Alex Magno wrote in the Manila Standard on Thursday that the rescue
mission has benefited "from an undue share of good luck" with no known hostage
casualties so far.
The military operation has
resulted in the death of 127 guerrillas, five soldiers and three government spies by
official count but also displaced at least 80,000 people -- or a fifth of the island's
population.
Relief workers motored into
Maimbung town on Jolo's south coast on Thursday to deliver food and other provisions to
civilians displaced by the fighting. A similar convoy made the rounds of evacuation
centers in Indanan town on Wednesday.
Back to Sipadan/Pandanan Hostages News
Back
to This Week's Borneo News |
