Ces Drilon and crew reunited with families

June 18, 2008

Two Philippine journalists were reunited with their families on Wednesday after a nine-day kidnap ordeal by Islamic militants who threatened to decapitate them.

Looking wane and covered in mosquito bites, Ces Drilon, one of the country’s best-known TV reporters, said she regretted venturing into the jungles of Jolo island, the base of the notorious Abu Sayyaf group, looking to interview militants.

“We came close to losing our lives,” she told reporters. “I thought I was so reckless, I didn’t think of my family.”

Drilon said her captors, who she referred to as bandits, were prepared at one point to behead her two cameramen. They were all released unharmed.

“We were treated well, in a perverse kind of way,” she said.

The police insisted no ransom was paid but Alvarez Isnaji, a local mayor who was the main negotiator, said a “minimal” sum, which he described as board and lodging fee, was given to the kidnappers.

The Abu Sayyaf, which relies on ransoms to fund its operations, had demanded P15 million ($338,000) to release them.

The Abu Sayyaf, which has about 350 members and a track record of decapitations, has made a successful business out of kidnap-for-ransom.

In 2000, the group held about 20 people, most of them Western tourists and Malaysian resort workers from nearby Sipadan island, for about three months. They freed them only after more than $10 million was paid for their release.

A year later, three Americans and more than a dozen Filipino tourists and resort workers were taken from the western island of Palawan. Two of the Americans were killed, including one who was beheaded, while most of the rest were freed for ransom.

The Abu Sayyaf has been blamed for the worst militant attack in the Philippines, the bombing of a ferry near Manila Bay in 2004 that killed more than 100 people.

Since 2002, U.S. military forces have been helping train and advise local troops to fight the group, pouring about $500 million into combat equipment and development projects to help turn Muslim communities against hardline Islamists.

In an interview with Reuters on Tuesday, the Philippines’ military chief said the prospect of a big ransom from the high-profile snatching of Drilon might encourage more people to join the group, which operates in a wretchedly poor part of the archipelago.

“There may be some who may join on a contractual basis if maybe the price is right,” Gen. Alexander Yano said.

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