Jolo dentist, nephew rescued from Sayyaf

ZAMBOANGA CITY — Government troops rescued a dentist and his nephew in Sulu shortly after midnight yesterday following a firefight with Abu Sayyaf guerrillas who kidnapped them in September, the military said.

Romeo Lao, 56, and Amor Rubio, 16, were recovered unharmed in Barangay Lagansa in Parang, Sulu, a stronghold of Abu Sayyaf gunmen, said Maj. Bartolome Bacarro, spokesman of the Armed Forces’ Southern Command.

This developed as Marines belonging to the Jolo Internal Defense Force, captured Commander Jainul, tagged as one of the leaders of the extremist group, in downtown Jolo the other day.

Brig. Gen. Gabriel Habacon, Southcom vice commander for operations, said Jainul was involved in the kidnapping of mostly foreign tourists in the Malaysian resort island of Sipadan three years ago.

He said Jainul, who has been brought to this city for tactical interrogation, was arrested in 2000 after he went to a bank here and tried to exchange more than $300,000, thought to be ransom money for the Sipadan hostages. He went into hiding after jumping bail.

Habacon heads Task Force Comet, a military unit running after Abu Sayyaf guerrillas.

Meanwhile, Lao and Rubio, looking thin and pale, were later flown to this city where military doctors examined them. They were not allowed to talk to reporters.

Maria Teresa Lao, Lao’s sister-in-law, said the dentist told her they were constantly on the run with their abductors and were not given enough food.

"I spoke with Dr. Lao, my brother-in-law, and he told me they were not maltreated, but he complained of lack of food," she said.

The two were seized last Sept. 5 by an Abu Sayyaf faction believed led by Galib Andang alias Commander Robot while they were on their way to open a family-owned mini bakery in downtown Jolo.

Maria Teresa Lao said the kidnappers initially demanded a ransom of P15 million, then lowered it to P13 million. No ransom was paid, she said.

Brig. Gen. Alexander Yapching, the military commander in Sulu, said soldiers swooped down on the kidnappers’ temporary lair in Barangay Lagansa at about 1 a.m.

He said the extremist rebels briefly gave a fight but later escaped and abandoned their two captives.

With Lao and Rubio rescued, the military now has to focus their efforts on saving a remaining kidnap victim in Sulu, former Land Bank of the Philippines employee Ramon Eloferio.

Eloferio was seized in his house in Barangay Busbus in Jolo last Nov. 21.

But authorities suspect that a business deal gone awry triggered Eloferio’s abduction.

The Abu Sayyaf is a small group of self-styled Islamic militants tagged by the Philippines and the United States as a terrorist organization with loose links to Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaeda network.

Abu Sayyaf leaders are also wanted by Washington for the deaths of two US hostages — Martin Burnham and Guillermo Sobero — they kidnapped in May 2001.

The guerrillas were also believed to be behind a series of bombings and attacks in the country’s troubled south in recent years. — With Jaime Laude and wire reports