Philippines refuses to negotiate despite hostage video

Brigadier General Alan Arrojado, Sulu Joint Task Force, commander

Military firm in ‘no negotiation or ransom’ policy after release of video showing thin, bearded and handcuffed foreign men appeal to governments

Philippine security officials reiterated Friday that they refuse to negotiate with a Daesh-linked group suspected of holding foreign hostages – including two Canadians and a Norwegian – captive in the country’s troubled south.

The commander of the Joint Task Force on the island province of Sulu insisted that the armed forces stood firm on the government policy of “no negotiations with the terrorists or any criminal group”.

“We’re following the policy of our government and this is no negotiations with the terrorist groups and no payment of ransom,” Brigadier General Alan Arrojado said in a text message.

The comments came a day after a video posted on the Facebook page of an “Abu Muhammad” showed Canadians John Ridsdel and Robert Hall and Norwegian Kjartan Sekkingstad – abducted in September – 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 until April 8 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.

Meanwhile, the Armed Forces’ Western Mindanao Command has condemned the Abu Sayyaf for the “inhumane treatment” exhibited by in the latest video.

“We condemn such terroristic and inhumane treatment of the victims,” Maj. Felimon Tan Jr., the Command’s spokesperson, told local reporters.

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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