One American hostage apparently dies, another rescued but wounded in Philippine military raid on Muslim extremist kidnappers
ZAMBOANGA, Philippines, Jun 07, 2002 (AP WorldStream via COMTEX) -- One U.S. hostage reportedly died and another was wounded but rescued Friday when Philippine troops launched a strike on Muslim extremist kidnappers in a southern fishing village, military officials said.
Martin Burnham, kidnapped more than a year ago along with his wife Gracia by Muslim extremists of the Abu Sayyaf group, was shot to death in the operation, said Gen. Roy Cimatu, the Philippine military chief of staff.
However, Maj. Gen. Ernesto Carolina, commander of Philippine forces in the south, would not confirm that Martin Burnham had been killed. "We have reports from our troops that Martin has been shot and killed, but we still want to confirm that further," he said.
Carolina said that Gracia Burnham was being operated on in a military hospital in the southern city of Zamboanga.
"She's here already," Carolina told reporters. "She is being operated on. It's a gunshot wound. She's talking. I think she will live."
The extent of the injuries she suffered in the rescue operation were not clear.
Philippine officers said hundreds of elite troops equipped with night vision goggles and backed by U.S. surveillance technology launched the attack to try to rescue the Wichita, Kansas, missionaries Friday as part of an extended rescue operation that has been going on for almost two weeks.
The Philippine military said intelligence showed that members of the Abu Sayyaf, a Muslim rebel group infamous for beheading hostages and captive soldiers, were holed up with at least one of the Burnhams in a Muslim fishing village in the southern province of Zamboanga del Norte.
The Light Reaction Company, a stealthy U.S.-trained unit equipped with silencers, night vision equipment and high-tech headsets, fanned out secretly throughout the area of coconut groves and farms in recent days after solid indications that at least one of the Burnhams was held near there.
The Burnhams, missionaries from Wichita, Kansas, were kidnapped May 27 of last year by the Abu Sayyaf, a Muslim extremist group which says it is fighting to carve a Muslim state out of the southern Philippines.
The guerrillas, thought to number only 60 or so from an original force of 1,000 after a year of army offensives, also kidnapped 18 others along with the Burnhams, including 17 Filipinos and Corona, California, resident Guillermo Sobero.
Sobero, reportedly ill, was beheaded last June by the guerrillas, according to U.S. and Filipino officials.
About 1,000 U.S. soldiers are in the southern Philippines, training local forces to better fight the Abu Sayyaf.
The extent of their involvement in the rescue mission wasn't immediately clear but they have used satellite technology and spy planes to pinpoint the hostages and their captors in the past.
By JIM GOMEZ Associated Press Writer
Copyright 2002 Associated Press, All rights reserved