Police have confirmed that Philippine TV broadcaster and newswoman Ces Drilon together with her two other news crew were abducted Sunday in the southernmost province Sulu by armed men believed to be members of the al-Qaeda-linked Abu Sayyaf Group. ABS-CBN Broadcasting Corp., a local top TV network, issued a brief statement saying their 3-man news team were sent to Mindanao upon the request of Mindanao State University Professor Octavio Dinmapo to cover an event, but have since gone missing in Sulu. Police Chief Joel Goltiao from the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao said the newsmen were intercepted in Maimbung, Sulu by armed men believed to be Abu Sayyaf members.

Goltiao says that the media group were supposedly picked up by Dinmapo in a university hostel but, “Along the way in Kulasi, Maimbung, Sulu, they were intercepted by an armed group and now they are held in captivity”. He said the group was brought to Indanan town in Sulu. He named the abductors as Albader Parad, an Abu Sayyaf member, and Gapur Jundain, a former member of the erstwhile separatist Moro National Liberation Front who recently joined the extremist group. Read the rest of this entry »