a502410

Yousef’s arrest in the Philippines in early 1995. 26 Janjalani was killed only a few
years in later, in 1998, by Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP). Following the
assumption of ASG’s command by Janjalani’s brother, Khadaffy, and Ghalib
Andang, ASG began regularly committing common crimes such as kidnappings
and extortions. These operations grew in April 2000, when ASG began targeting
foreigners for the purpose of extracting ransom payments. The first such
operation involved the raiding of a tourist resort in the Malaysian state of Sabah
and the kidnapping of twenty-one foreigners. In May of the following year, the
group again raided a tourist resort, this time on the Philippine island of Palawan,
where ASG kidnapped twenty people, including three Americans. In both of
these kidnapping cases, the Abu Sayyaf Group killed some hostages and released
the others after ransoms were paid.
Such activities continue today; for instance, in early January 2009, ASG militants
kidnapped three representatives of the International Committee of the Red Cross
(ICRC) in Patikul, Sulu. The three representatives arrived on island to observe
humanitarian operations in the province but were intercepted and kidnapped by
the militants. ASG immediately announced that three ICRC representatives (one
Swiss, one Italian, and one Filipina) were in their custody and demanded a stop
to police and military operations in Sulu and a ransom of Php 5 million (US
$250,000) for the safe release of the hostages.
27
The following month, ASG
operatives abducted three teachers in Zamboanga City in the main island of
Mindanao and two employees of a lending company in Basilan Island. 28
The Rajah Solaiman Movement
Background
Another Islamist group that takes up the cudgels for the transnational jihadist
movement is the Raja Solaiman Movement, an association of Christian converts
to Islam. Often associated with the Balik-Islam (Return to Islam) Movement, RSM
is composed of Filipino-Christians who converted to Islam as a result of the
Philippine government policy of sending Overseas Filipino Workers to the
Middle East beginning in the 1970s. RSM was organized in 2001 by Ahmed
Santos, who encouraged a group of twenty Muslim converts to undergo jihad
26
Ibid., 4.
27
“ICRC Halts Mindanao Work,” Filipino Reporter 37, no. 7, (23 January – 29 January 2009), 1, 10.
28
“Two More Abducted in Basilan,” The Filipino Express 23, no. 6 (6 February – 12 February 2009),
1, 21.
62