Military report: Filipino militant with links to foreign financiers leads Abu Sayyaf faction

Militant with money links leads Abu Sayyaf faction

MANILA, Philippines — A Filipino militant wanted by Washington has become leader of a key faction of Abu Sayyaf, the al-Qaida-linked extremist group in the southern Philippines for which he has previously acquired foreign funding, the Philippine military says.

A military report obtained by The Associated Press Sunday says the militant, Khair Mundus, has connections to funding donors from Saudi Arabia and Malaysia. It also says he has an ideological bent and has begun giving Islamic religious training to Abu Sayyaf fighters.

The United States last year offered $500,000 for information leading to the capture or killing of Mundus, who was arrested by Philippine authorities in 2004 but escaped from a local jail in 2007. While in police custody, Mundus confessed to having arranged the transfer of al-Qaida funds to an Abu Sayyaf chief to finance bombings and other attacks, according to the U.S. State Department.

The Abu Sayyaf, which means “Father of the Swordsman” in Arabic, was founded in 1991 on the predominantly Muslim island of Basilan in the Philippines’ south. It has been blamed for bombings, kidnappings, beheadings and has reportedly given sanctuary to Indonesian terror suspects, including Dulmatin, a key suspect in the 2002 Bali nightclub bombings who was killed by police in Indonesia last week.

Washington has blacklisted the Abu Sayyaf, which has nearly 400 fighters, as a terrorist organization. U.S.-backed offensives have killed or captured many of its commanders in recent years, leaving the group without an overall leader to unify its factions on Basilan, nearby Jolo island and the Zamboanga Peninsula.

Basilan lies about 550 miles (880 kilometers) south of the capital, Manila.

Documents recovered from an Abu Sayyaf camp captured by government troops and information from a Sri Lankan peace worker, who was kidnapped then freed by the militants last year, showed Mundus has emerged as the leader of the Basilan-based faction of the group, according to the military report.

Abu Sayyaf is trying to bring its militants back to a religious mooring, but its fighters will still resort to acts of banditry, like kidnappings, “to fuel large and high impact terrorist activities,” it says.

Rear Adm. Alex Pama, who heads a counterterrorism force, said recent offensives have targeted Mundus. About a week ago, army, marine and police forces captured a major Abu Sayyaf jungle camp near Basilan’s mountainous Sumisip township, which was believed to have been used by Mundus’s group for training and making bombs and booby traps.

At least six Abu Sayyaf fighters were killed and seven army soldiers were wounded in a series of clashes that ended with the fall of the camp on Hill 850, which could accommodate up to 80 militants. Several bombs and bomb-making components were found in the camp, Pama told The AP.

“We won’t give them time to settle in one place to train and make bombs,” Pama said.

The military report says Mundus’s deputy is the Basilan faction’s previous chief, Puruji Indama, a young and brutal commander blamed for the beheadings of 10 marines in 2007, an attack that prompted President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo to order a major offensive against the militants. Indama has also been linked to several kidnappings in Basilan.

The report says Mundus has connections to Saudi Arabian and Malaysian donors and arranged funds to be transferred to Abu Sayyaf chieftain Khadaffy Janjalani from 2001 to 2003 through Philippine banks under false names, the report said. Janjalani was killed by Philippine troops on Jolo in 2006.

Last year, Mundus provided religious training to Indama and other Abu Sayyaf militants on Basilan while a Jolo-based militant identified as Emran taught the militants how to make bombs, the report says.