Deadline looms over heads of Red Cross hostages in Philippines
Updated
In the Philippines, a deadline set by the kidnappers of three Red Cross workers draws near. The government has until the early hours of Tuesday to either restrict its troops on Jolo island to just two villages or face the prospect of having one of the hostages beheaded by the militant Abu Sayyaf group.
Presenter: Kanaha Sabapathy
Speaker: Abdusakur Tan, governor of Sulu province, Philippines; Nelson Navarro, columnist and political commentator, Manila
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SABAPATHY: At the weekend, the Philippines government agreed to withdraw one thousand marines and police from the village of Kuppong on Jolo island where they had cordoned off the kidnappers, the militant Abu Sayyaf.
In exchange for greater freedom of movement the kidnappers were to have released one of the three Red Cross hostages that they had abducted on January 15.
But according to Sulu governor and leader of the government's negotiating team, Abdusakur Tan, the kidnappers are now reverting to their original unreasonable demand that all government troops be stationed in just two villages in Sulu province.
TAN: The province is constituted by about 400 villages and they want the government forces limited to an area of two villages, which I think is very unreasonable.
SABAPATHY: The government is caught in a difficult situation. To give in to the Abu Sayyaf's demand is tantamount to giving up the province of Sulu, but to ignore it, it could possibly see one of the Red Cross hostages beheaded.
Columnist and political commentator Nelson Navarro says the current situation reflects the government's bankrupt policy on how to deal with kidnappers.
NAVARRO: The official policy has always been we don't deal with terrorists, we don't pay ransom. And then they go back on that because when it comes to the reality of being humiliated with people being beheaded and showing that the government doesn't have any handle on the situation, they recede. They pull out their military forces and they pay a ransom. It is also a way of encouraging these people because they know that they will have their way.
SABAPATHY: Military offensive against the kidnappers would be one option. But Sulu Governor Abdusakur Tan says it's one that the government is trying to avoid.
TAN: We are trying to exhaust all peaceful means to an immediate and safe release of the hostages.
SABAPATHY: ICRC president, Jakob Kellenberger, had himself appealed to the government and the kidnappers to seek the release of the three staff members who were abducted while on a humanitarian mission to Jolo prison.
But Nelson Navarro says it's difficult to appeal and to deal with groups that make kidnapping a business.
NAVARRO: Kidnapping in the Sulu Islands is an industry. Why plant coconuts, why go fishing? You can just kidnap somebody and you make instant millions and the government is powerless to stop you. Because the government turns a blind eye to all that is happening in this part of the country and then they only get the attention from the government when there is a situation like this, which really sets the government up for blackmail.
SABAPATHY: Nelson Navarro believes the kidnappers would seek to provoke the government by carrying out their threat to behead a hostage. But military action which could impact on civilian population could lead to an outcry of a religious war, he says.
NAVARRO: Of course they are provoking the government to bomb the civilian population because that will inflame, then it will become a religious war or the Christian government is out to exterminate Muslims, that is what they want. So the government is also powerless to deal with what is really a terrorist organisation. They try to confuse this with the causes of Islam and Muslim independence. There is ideology, and there is religion, but this is plain banditry.
SABAPATHY: In the past, the Abu Sayyaf have carried out beheadings and with the deadline drawing close what is the government going to do? Sulu governor, Abdusakur Tan:
TAN: We are just crossing our fingers, we are leaving it up to God.
