The Muslim extremist group Abu Sayyaf claimed responsibility yesterday for an explosion on a ferry that sparked a fire and left 180 passengers missing, according to a radio report.
The Radio Mindanao Network (RMN), which has often been called by the Abu Sayyaf in the past, said group spokesman Abu Sulaiman claimed a bomb was planted in revenge for alleged incidents of violence in the southern Mindandao area and the rapes of some Muslim women by Philippine troops.
The Friday fire on the Superferry 14 occurred the same day that two alleged Abu Sayyaf members were convicted of kidnapping an American in 2000 and another was arraigned in a separate mass abduction.
PHOTO: AFP
The military downplayed the Abu Sayyaf claim, saying it may have been a bluff by the guerrillas to project strength amid battle setbacks that have considerably weakened the group.
"They just want to ride and hitch on the media mileage on this Superferry fire," said military spokesman Lieutenant-Colonel Daniel Lucero.
Officials have not speculated on the cause of the fire, but said they could not rule out terrorism even though police sniffer dogs checked the ferry before it left Manila. Witnesses said the blaze was triggered by an explosion at 12:50am Friday, two hours into the ferry's regular trip to the central and southern Philippines.
RMN program director Benji Alejandro said that Sulaiman called him using a satellite phone that the rebels had used in the past and claimed responsibility for the ferry blast. He reminded Alejandro that the Abu Sayyaf had warned as early as October that they would target inter-island vessels belonging to WG&A, which owned the burned Superferry 14.
Alejandro acknowledged he received that rebel warning, asking Muslims not to ride WG&A vessels, and notified a WG&A official.
"This is a revenge," Alejandro quoted Sulaiman as saying.
Asked why the guerrillas targeted a ship full of civilians, Sulaiman cited several alleged incidents of Filipino Muslims being hurt during military assaults, Alejandro said.
Armed with axes and spotlights, rescuers struggled against heat, sea water and debris yesterday to probe the still-smoldering ferry, half-submerged on its side in a cove.
Coast guard officials said 565 passengers and 153 crew members jumped into the sea or boarded lifeboats and were rescued as the fire raged through the 10,192-tonne steel-hulled ferry.
A fire caused by a burst gas pipe yesterday spread to several homes and sent a fireball soaring into the sky outside Malaysia’s largest city, injuring more than 100 people. The towering inferno near a gas station in Putra Heights outside Kuala Lumpur was visible for kilometers and lasted for several hours. It happened during a public holiday as Muslims, who are the majority in Malaysia, celebrate the second day of Eid al-Fitr. National oil company Petronas said the fire started at one of its gas pipelines at 8:10am and the affected pipeline was later isolated. Disaster management officials said shutting the
US Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday accused Denmark of not having done enough to protect Greenland, when he visited the strategically placed and resource-rich Danish territory coveted by US President Donald Trump. Vance made his comment during a trip to the Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told a news conference. “You have under-invested in the people of Greenland, and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this
UNREST: The authorities in Turkey arrested 13 Turkish journalists in five days, deported a BBC correspondent and on Thursday arrested a reporter from Sweden Waving flags and chanting slogans, many hundreds of thousands of anti-government demonstrators on Saturday rallied in Istanbul, Turkey, in defence of democracy after the arrest of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu which sparked Turkey’s worst street unrest in more than a decade. Under a cloudless blue sky, vast crowds gathered in Maltepe on the Asian side of Turkey’s biggest city on the eve of the Eid al-Fitr celebration which started yesterday, marking the end of Ramadan. Ozgur Ozel, chairman of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), which organized the rally, said there were 2.2 million people in the crowd, but
JOINT EFFORTS: The three countries have been strengthening an alliance and pressing efforts to bolster deterrence against Beijing’s assertiveness in the South China Sea The US, Japan and the Philippines on Friday staged joint naval drills to boost crisis readiness off a disputed South China Sea shoal as a Chinese military ship kept watch from a distance. The Chinese frigate attempted to get closer to the waters, where the warships and aircraft from the three allied countries were undertaking maneuvers off the Scarborough Shoal — also known as Huangyan Island (黃岩島) and claimed by Taiwan and China — in an unsettling moment but it was warned by a Philippine frigate by radio and kept away. “There was a time when they attempted to maneuver
RSS