NEWSFLASH

GOVT TROOPS IN HOT PURSUIT OF KIDNAP GANG

Pagadian City, Oct. 19, 2001 - Security forces have launched a massive land, air and sea search in the Zamboanga Peninsula for the kidnappers of an Italian Catholic priest.

Fifteen gunmen snatched Fr. Giuseppi Pierantoni Wednesday night as the 44-year-old from Bologna was having dinner at the convent after saying Mass in a church in the coastal town of Dimataling in Zamboanga del Sur.

Witnesses told police the kidnappers dragged Pierantoni into a pump boat which sped toward the Lanao provinces as they indiscriminately fired their guns in the air.

Police gave chase but the pump boat of the kidnappers was too fast for their launches, witnesses added.

Army Lt. Gen. Roy Cimatu, military Southern Command chief, said the kidnappers could have been led by Akkidin Abdusalam, who is believed to be a guerrilla leader of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).

However, Armed Forces chief Gen. Diomedio Villanueva said they are looking into the possible role of Abu Sayyaf bandits in the latest kidnapping.

Pagadian City Bishop Zacarias Jimenez told Catholic-run radio station dxMS a man calling himself "Commander Ramsy" called up his residence and offered himself as an intermediary.

The caller sought P3,000 up front as a "mobilization budget," but Jimenez rejected the offer because the Church does not pay ransom demands.

The bishop downplayed links between the abduction and threats by Muslims of retaliation for the US-led air strikes on Afghanistan.

"This is purely a kidnap-for-ransom case, but perhaps later on this could be used by other groups in relation to the Afghanistan and Basilan situations," Jimenez said.

Fr. Jerry Sheehy, superior of the Sacred Heart of Jesus mission, pleaded yesterday to the kidnappers to safely release Pierantoni, who belongs to the order.

"We, the priests of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, are very sad and worried about the situation of our brother priest," he said. "We plead with those who have taken him to please release him unharmed as quickly as possible. We are calling on the goodness of your humanity."

Sheehy said Pierantoni had just celebrated Mass and was having dinner in the convent, when the kidnappers barged in and took him at gunpoint.

Pierantoni has been in Mindanao for the past 10 years, where he was assigned to the parish of Margosatubig in Zamboanga del Sur, followed by Bacolod, Lanao del Norte, and in Dimataling for the past three years, said Fr. Janusz Burzawa.

Pierantoni ran an "interfaith dialogue" in Dimataling, which sought to foster understanding between Christians and Muslims in Mindanao.

Villanueva said authorities were looking into links between the MILF "lost command" holding Pierantoni, and the Abu Sayyaf, which has sustained heavy casualties in Basilan.

"It’s possible they want (the military operation in Basilan) to ease up, but we will not allow it," he said.

Military officials said the Abu Sayyaf bandits are linked to Osama bin Laden, the main suspect in last month’s terrorist attack on the United States.

Cimatu said they are also looking into the possibility that the Pentagon gang, which is comprised of rogue MILF guerrillas, was involved in the kidnapping of Pierantoni.

"One angle that we are looking into, they might have gone to Lanao specially in Malabang and Sultan Gumander," he said. "This is being sought because there was an incident the other month about the kidnapping of a priest in Malabnag,"

However, Cimatu said Abu Sayyaf bandits might have links with the kidnappers and asked them to snatch Pierantoni to ease the military offensive on their jungle lair.

"Probably, there is that link between the Abu Sayyaf and the group of Kiddie," he said. "They are now asking this group of Kiddie to conduct diversionary (operations) to relieve the pressure and that is one of the possibilities. We have three theories and we are looking on all those theories."

Cimatu said Commander Ramsy belongs to Abdusalam’s gang, whose members killed Irish Catholic priest Rufus Bailey in the Lanao provinces last August.

"We are looking into the angle of bandits who may have escaped toward Malabang," he said. "We have also dispatched aircraft to conduct an air search in the hope that the pump boat they used might encounter engine problems."

The MILF denied yesterday any part in Pierantoni’s kidnapping and offered to help rescue the Italian priest as part of "confidence-building measures" amid peace talks with the government in Malaysia this week.

MILF spokesman Eid Kabalu told radio station dzRH yesterday they are investigating the kidnapping of Pierantoni to clear the name of the secessionist group.

"Definitely, this is not the work of the MILF," he said. " We do not resort to kidnapping activities to advance our cause. The MILF is not involved. It’s probably ordinary bandits."

Kabalu said the 12,500-strong MILF had helped negotiate the release of Italian Catholic priest Luciano Benedetti from another gang in the Lanao provinces in 1999.

"We are willing to go after the kidnappers, if the police and military will withdraw their forces to prevent any misencounter," he said.

In Maguindanao, Gov. Datu Andal Ampatuan ordered yesterday the provincial police to place under close watch coastal barangays in Upi and Datu Odin Sinsuat towns in case the kidnappers try to land there with Pierantoni.

Senior Superintendent Omar Ali, information director of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao police force, said intelligence agents were deployed in the second district of Lanao del Sur to check if Pierantoni had been brought to that province.