Foreign hostages plead for lives
in video
These photos are taken from Facebook account posted by a certain Abu Muhammad Thursday, Mrch 10, 2016.
Thin, bearded and handcuffed men
appeal to governments for help securing release, saying if kidnapper’s demands
are not met they will be killed
Three foreigners suspected of being kidnapped by a
Daesh-linked group in the Philippines south nearly six months ago have pleaded
for their lives in footage uploaded to the Internet.
A video on the Facebook page of an “Abu Muhammad”
on Thursday showed Canadians John Ridsdel and Robert Hall and Norwegian Kjartan
Sekkingstad shirtless and surrounded by armed men.
Hall identifies their captors as the Abu Sayyaf.
The three thin, bearded and handcuffed men appeal
to their governments for help securing their release, saying that if their
kidnapper’s demands are not met they will be killed.
“To the Canadian prime minister and to the Canadian
people in the world, please do as needed to meet their demands within one month
or they will kill me, they will execute us,” Ridsel — a Canadian mining
consultant — pleads as a long haired man holds what appears to be a machete to
his neck.
The video is the second to surface since the trio
were kidnapped from a resort on Samal Island in Davao del Norte in September
with Filipina Marites Flor.
In the first video, the kidnappers demanded P1
billion pesos ($21,500) for each of the three foreigners.
“The Canadian government has got to get us out of
here fast,” Sekkingstad adds in Thursday’s video, saying that they are being
held hostage on Sulu Island — an Abu Sayyaf stronghold in the country’s south.
“This is the last message to families, friends and
authorities… follow the negotiations and try to meet their demands or we’re all
dead,” he adds.
Asked by reporters to comment on the latest video,
Brig-Gen. Alan Arrojado, Sulu Joint Task Force commander, declined saying he
was still to see it full.
The Philippines government has repeatedly
maintained a no negotiation or ransom policy with such groups.
The Abu Sayyaf — which has reportedly pledged
allegiance to Daesh — is also holding a Dutch man kidnapped more than three
years ago in Tawi-Tawi and a former Italian priest seized last year in
Zamboanga del Norte.
Since 1991, the group — armed with mostly
improvised explosive devices, mortars and automatic rifles — has carried out
bombings, kidnappings, assassinations and extortions in a self-determined fight
for an independent Islamic province in the Philippines.
It is notorious for beheading victims after ransoms
have failed to be paid for their release.
The Philippines government has repeatedly
maintained a no negotiation or ransom policy with such groups.
The Abu Sayyaf — which has reportedly pledged
allegiance to Daesh — is also holding a Dutch man kidnapped more than three
years ago in Tawi-Tawi and a former Italian priest seized last year in
Zamboanga del Norte.
Since 1991, the group — armed with mostly
improvised explosive devices, mortars and automatic rifles — has carried out
bombings, kidnappings, assassinations and extortions in a self-determined fight
for an independent Islamic province in the Philippines.
It is notorious for beheading victims after ransoms
have failed to be paid for their release.
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