Word: sayyaf
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...When presented with new data or surprising briefings, Arroyo will hit the phones to cross-check the info herself. She insists on hourly updates about the drive against Abu Sayyaf. She rings her own network of contacts, built up during her days in the Senate and as Estrada's Vice President and Social Welfare Secretary. Says Rigoberto Tiglao, the palace spokesman: "As President, you get so much advice?wrong or right?that after a while, if your intellect isn't that good, you stop trying to process it and you hide in a cocoon of close advisers. But President Arroyo...
...sounded like an unexpected act of charity by Abu Sayyaf rebels, who are holding three Americans and more than 20 Filipinos hostage in the jungles of the southern Philippines. Calling a Mindanao radio station by satellite phone last Tuesday, harsh-voiced rebel spokesman Abu Sabaya said: "As our gift in the celebration of Independence Day, we have released unconditionally Guillermo Sobero" (one of the three American captives). The spokesman then paused before delivering his taunting punchline: "But we have released him without his head." That morning, President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo was due to oversee Manila's Independence Day parade with...
...Arroyo, say aides, was shattered. Earlier, Abu Sayyaf, a group that uses an Islamic banner to justify kidnapping, massacres and extortion, had given the President 48 hours to accept a Malaysian businessman as negotiator. After that, Abu Sayyaf threatened, it would start killing the hostages. With the clock ticking away, Arroyo gave in to the rebels' demands?only to have them boast of beheading the Californian tourist anyway. Jeered Abu Sabaya: "It's up to you to find Sobero's head ... but the dogs may beat you to it." Speaking to diplomats after the 103rd Independence Day festivities, the diminutive...
...Sayyaf is Arroyo's hardest challenge yet: she's forced to deal not only with a gang of cutthroat kidnappers motivated by lucre and Islamic zealotry but also the needs of Big Brother in Washington, concerned about the fate of the three Americans. Arroyo wants to crush the "bandit-terrorists," as she calls them. "We'll give you the peace of the grave," she vowed after the rebels escaped an army siege two weeks ago. That's a good demonstration of the determination that is the bedrock of Arroyo's character?which transformed the former economist and bureaucrat into...
...Security experts claim that these two commanders might either reinforce the hostage-takers on Basilan island or throw the Philippine government into greater disarray by attacking another tourist beach resort and grabbing more hostages. Either way, Arroyo's soldiers may have blown their best chance to finish off Abu Sayyaf. It's an opportunity that may not repeat itself anytime soon...