Four killed as Duterte ramps up war on Abu Sayyaf

This article is more than 12 months old

Apr 24, 2017 06:00 am

MANILA Four gunmen have been killed on a Philippine tourist island as President Rodrigo Duterte ordered the military yesterday to kill remnants of an Islamic militant group behind a foiled mass kidnapping attempt there.

The authorities said the dead suspects and three others on the run were stragglers from a boatload of southern Philippines-based Abu Sayyaf gunmen who sailed to the central island of Bohol this month as part of a plot to kidnap tourists.

The raid had signalled an escalation of the kidnapping threat from the Abu Sayyaf, who is based on remote islands and is also blamed for beheadings and deadly bombings, prompting Mr Duterte to vow retribution.

"I told the military: Do not sleep. Find them. Kill them. I want them dead. Do not give them to me alive," he said about the fresh fighting in Bohol. - AFP