(MENAFN- The Journal Of Turkish Weekly) >Philippines security forces have arrested an Abu Sayyaf militant who was involved in the kidnapping of 21 mostly westerners at a Malaysian luxury island resort in 2000, a police official said Monday.
Sr. Insp. Helen Galvez, spokesperson of the Zamboanga City Police Office, said in a statement that Edward Lee Pisan also known as Salih Abdulla Jainal, 52, was arrested outside a local shopping mall Saturday afternoon.
Galvez said Pisan has a standing warrant of arrest for kidnapping and serious illegal detention issued by a court in Sulu province in connection with the kidnapping of 21 people -- 10 Europeans and 11 Asians -- in April 23, 2000 at the Sipadan Dive Resort in Malaysia.
She said Pisan was a follower of the top Abu Sayyaf leader Ghalib Andang (alias Commander Robot) who was killed along with two other militants in a foiled jailbreak in Manila.
Andang was wounded and captured in an encounter with security forces in Jolo island three years after he led the Sipadan kidnapping.
Galvez said Pisan was believed to have moved to Zamboanga City after the 2000 kidnapping, whee he was arrested on a combined police and military force operation Saturday.
The capture comes as heavily armed soldiers are deployed in various parts of Zamboanga City, with the military concerned of a possible "spillover" of an on-going military offensive against the Daesh-linked group in nearby Basilan and Jolo islands.
Since 1991, the Abu Sayyaf group -- armed with mostly improvised explosive devices, mortars and automatic rifles -- has carried out bombings, kidnappings, assassinations and extortions in a self-determined fight for an independent province in the Philippines.
Earlier this year, the group beheaded two Canadian hostages after ransoms failed to be paid.
By Roy Ramos