UPDATES TO ADD DETAILS ON RELEASE IN PHILIPPINES
By Ainur Rohmah
TUBAN, Indonesia (AA) – Indonesia’s president confirmed Wednesday that four nationals held hostage in the southern Philippines for nearly a month had been released.
“Thank God, finally the four Indonesian citizens taken hostage by armed groups… have been released. They are in good condition,” kompas.com quoted Joko Widodo as saying at the presidential palace in Jakarta.
Earlier this month, the Daesh-linked Abu Sayyaf militant group had released 10 other Indonesian sailors, turning them over to the governor of the Muslim majority southern Philippine province of Sulu.
Indonesian authorities have insisted that the government did not pay a 50 million peso ($1 million) ransom demanded for the release of the 10 men, who were seized off the Philippines’ Tawi-Tawi island province in late March.
Their release came six days after the Abu Sayyaf beheaded a Canadian hostage, 68-year-old John Ridsdel, after a 300-million pesos ($6 million) ransom failed to be paid.
“I thanked the Philippine government for providing excellent cooperation in the double release of the hostages,” Widodo said, adding that the four men freed Wednesday would be returned to Indonesia shortly.
The Philippine Star newspaper reported that Abu Sayyaf members turned over the four crew to the Philippines’ one-time biggest Moro revolutionary group after negotiations initiated by the Moro National Liberation Front’s wanted leader, Nur Misuari.
The police chief of Sulu’s capital Jolo confirmed that the hostages were delivered to the residence of Sulu Governor Abdusakur Tan II — a relative of Misuari — in the afternoon, before being transported to a hospital for a medical check-up.
The Inquirer newspaper quoted Supt. Junpikar Sittin as saying that a 50 million peso ransom had been paid.
Last week, Indonesia agreed to hold joint patrols with the Philippines and Malaysia following a trilateral meeting to address recent hijacking and kidnapping incidents in the region’s waters.
In early April, Filipino gunmen also abducted four Malaysian crew from a vessel off the Malaysian state of Sabah, whose eastern coast is located just around 50 nautical miles from the southernmost Philippine island of Sitangkai.
The Abu Sayyaf is believed to still be holding several captives, including a Canadian, a Norwegian and a Filipino woman seized in September and a Dutch national kidnapped more than three years ago in Tawi-Tawi.
Since 1991, the group — armed with mostly improvised explosive devices, mortars and automatic rifles — has carried out bombings, kidnappings, assassinations and extortions.
It is notorious for beheading victims after ransoms have failed to be paid for their release.
* Anadolu Agency correspondent Hader Glang contributed to this report from the Philippines
