3 Basilan informers each get P18.7M

[pissword]

huwaw...

http://news.inq7.net/nation/index.ph...story_id=16101


3 Basilan informers each get P18.7M

Updated 01:39am (Mla time) Oct 26, 2004
By TJ Burgonio
Inquirer News Service



Editor's Note: Published on page A1 of the Oct. 26, 2004 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer

US EMBASSY officials yesterday rewarded three Basilan residents with P18.7 million each for providing vital information that led to the killing of an Abu Sayyaf gang leader.

US Embassy deputy chief Joseph Mussomeli handed over brown suitcases containing stacks of P1,000 bills to two men and one woman in a tightly guarded ceremony at the provincial hospital in Isabela town, Basilan province.

The three informants, who wore baseball caps and hid their faces under thick brown stockings, each wordlessly accepted the P18.7 million. Their identities were being kept secret for security reasons.

"It takes courage to do what these three people have done, which makes them exactly the opposite of those we fight against," Mussomeli said, calling the Abu Sayyaf bandits cowards for terrorizing the weak and the helpless.

The three had provided information that led government troops to Hamsiraji Sali, also known as Jose Ramirez, who was later killed in a firefight in Basilan on April 8 this year, the US Embassy said in a statement.

Sali was a leader of the Abu Sayyaf, a Moro armed group which gained notoriety years ago for seizing mostly foreign tourists in exchange for millions of dollars in ransom and for executing some of their hostages, including an American.

Sali was the second senior ASG member on the US wanted list to be killed. The other three, including leader Khaddafy Janjalani, remain at large.

The Abu Sayyaf had been linked by both Washington and Manila to the al-Qaeda network of Osama bin Laden.