The Wutz Up in the Philippines!

Moro rebs deny they are holding Irish priest

MANILA, Philippines—Interior Secretary Ronaldo Puno Tuesday claimed that members of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) were behind the abduction of Fr. Michael Sinnott, thus slamming the door on the separatist group’s offer to help free the Irish missionary.

“It is clear to us that the kidnappers are either directly connected to or very closely associated with the MILF,” Puno said at a news briefing in Camp Crame national police headquarters.

Asked to elaborate, he said: “In the process of the case buildup, the identities of the kidnappers started to surface and a great majority of them are actually identified as members of the MILF 113th Base Command.”

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KIDNAPPED IRISH priest Fr Michael Sinnott is believed to be alive and efforts are being made to verify the identity of groups who abducted him more than two weeks ago, but many questions remain over his plight.

Fr Sinnott was snatched from his compound on October 11th by six gunmen who barged into the Columban House in Pagadian City in Zamboanga del Sur province, 890km south of Manila.

“I am still waiting and hoping,” said Fr Pat O’Donoghue, regional director of the Columban Fathers in the area. The group which kidnapped Fr Sinnott is believed to be moving around the jungle area of the southern Philippines in which he is being held, reportedly on the border areas of the two Lanao provinces, but the priest’s exact whereabouts remain a mystery.

There has been a bewildering number of different reports about the missionary’s whereabouts, about his physical state and about who is holding him.

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