Philippines: Gunmen free SKorean captain, Filipino crew

By Hader Glang

ZAMBAOANGA CITY, the Philippines (AA) - Gunmen linked to a Daesh-affiliated militant group have released a South Korean captain and a Filipino abducted from a cargo vessel off the troubled southern Philippines in October.

The Rappler news website reported that the release of the two hostages was brokered by the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) rebel group, which is involved in an ongoing peace process with the government of President Rodrigo Duterte.

South Korean Park Chul Hong and Filipino Glenn Alindajao were turned over to the former governor of Sulu island province, Abdusakur Tan, who handed them over to Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process Secretary Jesus Dureza at an airport in provincial capital Jolo.

Dureza accompanied Park and Alindajao to an airport in Davao City, Duterte’s hometown in southern Mindanao island.

Dureza was quoted as saying that no ransom had been paid, and authorities were uncertain about whether the two men were actually released by the Daesh-linked Abu Sayyaf since the hostages had been transferred among kidnap-for-ransom gangs.

Park was the captain of a South Korean-flagged 11,400-ton cargo ship that was attacked by gunmen claiming to be Abu Sayyaf members in October off the island province of TAwi-Tawi -- another Abu Sayyaf stronghold.

Kidnap-for-ransom gangs operating in the nearby Sulu and Celebes seas are known to hand over their captives to the Abu Sayyaf militant group and negotiate for a ransom that, if paid, is shared with the group.

Earlier this year, the Abu Sayyaf beheaded two Canadian hostages after million-dollar ransoms failed to be paid.

Since 1991, the group -- armed with mostly improvised explosive devices, mortars and automatic rifles -- has carried out bombings, kidnappings, assassinations and extortion in a self-determined fight for an independent province in the Philippines.

It among the militant groups in the south to have pledged allegiance to Daesh, prompting fears during the stalling of a peace process between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front -- which broke away from the MNLF -- that it could make inroads in a region torn by decades of armed conflict.