ZAMBOANGA CITY, 15 September 2005 — Security forces arrested a leader of the former separatist rebel group Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) who had been implicated in the 2001 kidnapping of five Chinese engineers and an Italian missionary in the southern Philippines, officials said yesterday.
Nurham Amil, alias Commander Ramsey, now leader of the notorious kidnap group Pentagon Gang, was nabbed before midnight Tuesday at an army checkpoint in the town of Leon Postigo in Zamboanga del Norte province.
“He is undergoing tactical interrogation,” Maj. Gen. Gabriel Habacon, commander of the army’s 1st Infantry Division, told Arab News.
Habacon said pursuit operations against the Pentagon Gang and the Abu Sayyaf are continuing.
Philippine Army chief Lt. Gen. Hermogenes Esperon said members of the army’s Special Forces have been pursuing Amil in the past weeks until they tracked him down in Leon Postigo town. “The arrest of Amil is the result of a long surveillance operation. Let this be a warning to other terrorists that there is no escape; they should surrender peacefully,” Esperon said in a separate interview.
The Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), which is currently negotiating peace with the government, commended the arrest of Amil.
“The MILF welcomes the news of Amil’s arrest and we hope this would put an end to the series of kidnappings perpetrated by criminals,” MILF spokesman Eid Kabalu said. The MILF is currently helping the military and police in pursuing criminals and terrorists in areas where it is actively operating as part of an agreement it signed with the government last year.
Amil had been tagged as one of the country’s most wanted terrorist alongside Khadaffy Janjalani, leader of the Abu Sayyaf group. The military also linked Amil to the kidnapping of Italian priest Giuseppe Pierantoni in the southern Philippines in October 2001.
The 44-year old missionary was held hostage in Lanao del Sur for several weeks until ransom had been paid by private negotiators.
Police and military authorities linked the Pentagon Gang in the series of kidnappings of foreigners and local traders in the southern Philippines.
The Pentagon Gang also snatched five Chinese engineers working on a government irrigation project in Carmen town in North Cotabato province in 2001 and later killed two of the hostages.
The United States listed the Pentagon Gang as a foreign terrorist organization and offered rewards for the capture of its leaders.
