Free Republic

MANILA, Philippines (AP) - Gunmen abducted an Italian Roman Catholic priest who was on his way to a remote village to celebrate Sunday Mass in the southern Philippines, police said. Giancarlo Bossi, 57, was riding his motorcycle in Zamboanga Sibugay province's Payao township, about 500 miles south of Manila, when about 10 armed men blocked his path then seized him, said Senior Superintendent Francisco Cristobal, the provincial police chief. Cristobal said he suspected Moro Islamic Liberation Front rebels who operate in Zamboanga Sibugay, despite a cease-fire agreement with the government. He did not elaborate, but said that al-Qaida-linked Abu Sayyaf...

Arroyo: ‘Terrorism in Southern Philippines, Iraq the Same’GMA Mobilizes Barangay Units in Anti-terror War Terrorism is our enemy. In her weekly radio address Saturday morning, President Gloria Arroyo called upon the Filipino public to unite in the face of the on-going Middle East crisis. Likewise, Pres. Arroyo likened the war in Iraq to the one in southern Philippines as having the same face: “The war in Iraq and the chaos in Mindanao has the same enemy - terrorism.” “We have to disarm Iraq of their weapons of mass destruction or else these may be smuggled into our country and used...