Rebel leader threatens to kill American in Philippines

A Muslim extremist leader told a local radio station he will kill an American hostage on Monday unless the Philippine government appoints two Malaysians to negotiate the release of the rebels' captives.

As the deadline neared, members of his Abu Sayyaf group attacked a plantation in central Basilan, taking an unknown number of children and a security guard hostage, said Tahira Ishmail, mayor–elect of Lantawan town on the southern island of Basilan.

Officials said the group's three American hostages may have been dragged along with the attackers.

"I hope they don't touch the children," said Ishmail, who reported the incident occurred near her town and involved both Muslim and Christian children. "They're innocent. They don't know what's going on."

Col. Hermogenes Esperon, army brigadier commander on Basilan island, said some children were taken in the raid on the 500–hectare (1,200–acre) coconut and coffee plantation along with one of the plantation's owners and a security guard. They also burned a chapel and a hut, he said.

Esperon said troops were on their way to the area to fight the guerrillas.

Abu Sabaya, a leader of the Abu Sayyaf group, had threatened on last Thursday to kill a Californian and a Kansas couple with a vague deadline, then reiterated it in his first call since then to a local radio station Monday morning.

The threat was apparently to kill only one hostage, although Sabaya previously threatened to kill more than one of the three Americans he holds in addition to 10 Filipinos on the southern Island of Basilan.

Asked whether he will kill an American or a Filipino, he said: "I will make sure it will be a white."

In his call to Radio Mindanao Network, Sabaya reiterated his call for the government to bring in the Malaysians, who helped negotiate the release last year of another batch of Abu Sayyaf hostages, reportedly for millions of dollars in ransom.

"If the Malaysians are allowed to enter, we will release some of the hostages as a good gesture," Sabaya told RMN. "The time is running out. No deal. Take it or leave it. Each hour is important.

"It's (the government's) responsibility if these white people lose their heads," Sabaya said. He usually makes such announcements through the southern radio station.

Military spokesman Brig. Gen. Edilberto Adan called for more time to consider the guerrilla request and reiterated the government's no–ransom policy.

"That's a short time for the government to look into that and to contact the Malaysian government," Adan said. "The (Abu Sayyaf) should give our civilian negotiators time to study this and take the necessary actions."

He said, however, that Sabaya may be bluffing.

"We can't just believe everything he says. This could be another one of his ploys," Adan said.

The Abu Sayyaf has often threatened to kill foreign hostages in the past without doing so.

Adan also issued a stern warning to Sabaya against harming the hostages.

"There will be implications not only for him but also his family and his clan," Adan said.

Ishmail said 30 to 50 families fled a nearby village over the weekend after they spotted Abu Sayyaf guerrillas nearby with several hostages, including Californian Guillermo Sobero and Kansas missionaries Martin and Gracia Burnham.

She said the Abu Sayyaf set up lookouts and checkpoints in the area as thousands of troops scoured the small southern island for signs of the rebel group.

The Abu Sayyaf says it is fighting to carve out an independent Islamic state from the southern Philippines, but the government says the group is engaged in mere banditry. Muslims are a minority in mostly Roman Catholic Philippines.

Basilan, one of the southern islands that the Abu Sayyaf uses as a base, is predominantly Muslim with a large Christian minority.

Millions of dollars in ransoms were reportedly brokered by Libya to end last year's hostage crisis. The military says the money allowed the rebels to buy arms and speedboats used in the May 27 abduction of tourists, including the Americans, from a beach resort across the Sulu Sea.

Presidential spokesman Rigoberto Tiglao has said a foreign mediator "might cause some misunderstanding," and President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo reiterated her no–ransom policy Sunday.

The guerrillas are believed to have split their 13 hostages into at least two groups to avoid detection in thick jungles.

The government is preparing for peace talks later this month with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, a much larger but less radical Muslim separatist group in the southern Philippines. A second round of peace talks started Sunday with the New People's Army, a communist rebel group fighting a Marxist rebellion throughout the Philippines.

However, Arroyo ordered all–out war with the Abu Sayyaf. She says these rebels are driven by the pursuit of money, particularly through kidnapping for ransom.