By Geert De Clercq
MANILA, April 1 (Reuters) - The Abu Sayyaf Muslim militant group in the Philippines is ready to strike in the capital Manila and has a long line of bombers eager to die, a newspaper on Thursday quoted the group's leader as saying.
President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo said earlier this week her security forces had uncovered an Abu Sayyaf cell in Manila, arresting six men and seizing nearly 40 kg (80 lb) of explosives intended to be used in "Madrid-level" attacks. Relatives of two of the six said on Thursday they had been framed by police.
"Even we were surprised at how many want to be martyrs, the queue is long, we will not run out of bombers," Abu Sayyaf leader Khaddafy Janjalani was quoted as saying in the Philippine Daily Inquirer, the country's largest newspaper.
Reporter Arlyn dela Cruz told Reuters that Janjalani, believed by the military to be in hiding in the southern island of Mindanao, had contacted her after the suspected militants were arrested. In 2002, she was held hostage by Muslim rebels for four months and now is one of the few to have access to Abu Sayyaf.
Dela Cruz said the Abu Sayyaf read her a statement that said the group has cells in several Filipino cities, including "your capital city, where our operatives have struck and are ready to strike at any given time".
She said Janjalani admitted one of those arrested was his cousin, said by the government to have beheaded U.S citizen Guillermo Sobero after he was kidnapped from a resort in 2001.
The paper also quoted Abu Soliman, described as Abu Sayyaf's number two, as saying the group demands the release of Muslims detained by the Manila government and the immediate withdrawal of all Christians from Muslim land in the southern Philippines.
"A BIG MISTAKE"
Soliman said the group also demands the release of Muslims detained by the U.S. military in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba and the immediate withdrawal of foreigners from the Arabian peninsula.
The Abu Sayyaf group was linked with Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda in the 1990s, but many analysts believe the ties no longer exist, even if the group's demands echo those of al Qaeda.
Soliman was quoted as saying Abu Sayyaf was responsible for planting a bomb in a ferry near Manila in February before it sank, killing more than 100 people. Investigators have not yet established whether a bomb caused the ship to sink.
After gaining notoriety in the early 1990s for a series of bomb attacks in the southern Philippines, the Abu Sayyaf turned to kidnapping for ransom and was denounced as "unIslamic" by other Muslim militant groups.
The government says its numbers have fallen to about 300 from 1,000 four years ago as a result of infighting between different factions and a U.S.-backed military campaign to crush it.
The relatives of Abdulwali Villanueva and Habil Delleosa, two of the six men arrested for alleged involvement with Abu Sayyaf, denied the suspects had any link to the group.
President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo said on Tuesday the men were part of an Abu Sayyaf cell planning an attack such as the one on commuter trains in Madrid three weeks ago.
"His arrest was a big mistake," Villanueva's pregnant wife Hannah told reporters. She denied her husband belonged to any terror group and said explosives found on him had been planted.
Delleosa's sister said he too had been framed.