26 November 2000 - ABS-CBN

ZAMBOANGA CITY (ABS-CBN) - Members of the military on a mission to rescue American hostage Jeffrey Schilling and Filipino Ronaldo Ullah being held by the Abu Sayyaf killed one rebel in a clash this week in Jolo, the military said Saturday.

The Associated Press said the troops chanced upon a band of Abu Sayyaf gunmen in a village in Patikul town on Jolo Friday, triggering a 10-minute clash that left one rebel dead. The other rebels fled into a forest.

There were no government casualties.

The government has pressed on with the operation to rescue Schilling and Ullah.

The military launched an operation to rescue originally 19 people held by the Abu Sayyaf on September 16. Seventeen of the captives have been rescued or had escaped during the operation, leaving Schilling and Ullah still in rebel hands.

In an interview last week, Schilling, a Muslim convert from Oakland, California, said he is being kept in chains and is losing hope he would be released.

Ullah, the longest-held hostage, was seized in April along with 20 other tourists and workers from the Malaysian resort of Sipadan and brought to Jolo.

The rebels later abducted scores of other hostages.

The other Sipadan hostages were released in separate groups in exchange for more than $15 million in ransom, hostage negotiators said.

The Abu Sayyaf is the smaller but more radical of two Muslim rebel groups fighting for an independent Islamic state in the southern Philippines.

The military, however, considers it a bandit group engaged in ransom kidnappings and attacks against Christians.

The military said at least 183 Abu Sayyaf members have been killed and more than 210 others have surrendered since it launched the rescue operation.

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