Philippines - Excerpt DoS Country Report on Terrorism, 26 April 2006

Philippines

The major, and disturbing, trend in the Philippines has been the growing cooperation among the Islamist terrorist organizations operating in the country: Jemaah Islamiya (JI); the Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG); and the Rajah Sulaiman Movement (RSM). The near-simultaneous Valentine's Day bombings in Manila, Davao, and General Santos City involved operatives from all three entities and resulted in eight deaths and 150 injuries.

These bombings also used more technically sophisticated explosive devices, another cause for concern. The RSM, composed of Christian converts to Islam, has the ability to blend in and move freely about Luzon and other urban areas of the Philippines. The Philippines experienced another domestic terrorist attack in August when a bomb exploded aboard the Dona Rosa passenger ferry in Basilan, injuring 30 people, four of whom subsequently died.

Philippine authorities had a number of successes against terrorists in 2005. The government's most recent successes were the arrest in October of several members of the ASG-affiliated Rajah Sulaiman Movement, including RSM leader Ahmad Santos, and the arrest in December of RSM's alleged second-in-command and operations chief, Pio de Vera. The Antiterrorism Task Force (ATTF) arrested, captured, or killed 83 suspected terrorists. In March, it coordinated operations that led to the seizure of 600 kilos of ammonium nitrate and other bomb making materials stored in an apartment in Quezon City in the metropolitan Manila area.

Several terrorists were convicted in Philippine courts. In June, a Philippine court convicted seven members of the Abu Sayyaf Group responsible for the Dos Palmas kidnapping, the Lamitan siege, the Golden Harvest massacre, and the Balobo massacre, which all took place in the Southern Philippines in 2001. In October, a court convicted RSM operative Angelo Trinidad, JI operative Rohmat (aka Zaki), and ASG operative Gamal Baharan for their roles in the February 14 triple-city bombings.

Several key ASG figures were also killed during armed encounters with the Philippine armed forces. Wedjimeh Sayad and Ahmad Sabudin, operatives serving under ASG sub-leader Jundam Jamalul, were killed in an encounter in Sulu on September 5. Jainal Usman, a senior ASG lieutenant who was behind the abduction of six Malaysian resort workers in 2003, was killed in fighting in Tawi-Tawi on November 17 along with two subordinates, Faizal Mohammad and Pula Ali.

The Philippines made some progress in tracking, blocking, and seizing terrorist assets. The main body tasked with investigating terrorist finance cases, the Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC), completed the first phase of its information technology upgrades in 2004. From January to October 2005, AMLC received 1,760 suspicious transaction reports involving 8144 suspicious transactions, as well as covered transaction reports involving 44 million covered transactions. Because of the significant improvements in the government’s anti-money laundering capacity and efforts, and the AMLC's accomplishments and efforts in addressing remaining vulnerabilities, the OECD's Financial Action Task Force removed the Philippines from the Non-Cooperative Countries and Territories list in February. Subsequently, AMLC was accepted as a member of the Egmont Group, a prominent body of financial intelligence units that fosters international cooperation.

The government continued to imprison Juanito Itaas, convicted by Philippine courts in connection with the 1989 murder of Colonel James Rowe, the deputy commander of the Joint U.S. Military Advisory Group. Donato Continente, also convicted as an accessory to the murder, was released in June after serving his full term. Both Itaas and Continente were associated with the Communist Party of the Philippines/New People’s Army (CPP/NPA) terrorist group at the time of the murder.

The absence of a law defining and codifying terrorist acts, combined with restrictions on gathering of evidence, continues to hinder the building of effective terrorism cases in the Philippines. These problems include rampant corruption, low morale, inadequate salaries, recruitment and retention difficulties, lack of information technology upgrades, and lack of cooperation between police and prosecutors.

A large and growing case backlog and the absence of continuous trials for terrorism cases are major impediments to the Philippines' prosecution of suspected terrorists. After four successive years of trying, the Philippines came closer to enacting new counterterrorism legislation in 2005. A counterterrorism bill passed its second out of three readings in the House of Representatives in December. The bill remains stalled in the Senate, which is seeking assurances that provisions of the legislation could not be used by the government against political opponents as well as against terrorists.