BY RAYMOND AFRICA

ABU Sayyaf bandits holding three delegates of the International Committee of the Red Cross for more than two months in Sulu have threatened to behead one of the captives at 2 p.m. today if authorities fail to comply with their demand for a total pullout of government forces.

A Marines officer in Sulu said security forces would assault the Abu Sayyaf lair if the bandits behead one of the ICRC delegates, Swiss Andreas Notter, Italian Eugenio Vagni, and Filipino Mary Jean Lacaba.

"We will implement the military option...That has been addressed even before," the official said on condition of anonymity.

Interior Secretary Ronaldo Puno, in a press conference in Camp Crame yesterday, said the bandits led by Albader Parad want military, police and civilian forces out of 15 barangays in five towns in Sulu in 24 hours.

The third and latest demand was relayed 9:50 p.m. Sunday.

Some two weeks ago, the kidnappers demanded a pullback or repositioning of Marines cordoning them in Indanan town. The cordon was set up days after the three were kidnapped in Patikul town January 15.

Authorities complied but Parad, instead of keeping his promise to release one of the hostages in exchange for the pullback, demanded that all troops deployed in Sulu province be transferred to the capital town of Jolo.

The second demand carried the threat to behead one of the hostages if authorities fail to comply by today.

Puno said the kidnappers’ latest demand involved the complete pullout of troops in the "southwest quadrant" of Sulu covering Indanan, Patikul, Maiumbung, Parang and Talipao towns.

He said it was "physically impossible" to comply with the latest demand. He noted the Abu Sayyaf’s earlier demand to pull back police and civilian forces took two days to complete. Even a small contingent of less than 30 Marines who were doing construction work to bring water to one of the towns in Sulu took a full day to evacuate the area, he said.

"It is tantamount to saying that we should evacuate Camp Crame in 24 hours… So I don’t know how they can be serious if they are saying that we should evacuate all of these areas within 24 hours and then schedule a beheading at 2 p.m.," he said.

"And I’m not sure that it is a wise policy — to give up an entire province every time anybody, somebody is kidnapped. It will encourage everybody everywhere to kidnap someone and demand an entire province in return," he added.

Puno said the bandits want the three major bases of the Marines in the southwest quadrant to be vacated within 24 hours.

These bases are in Santol in Patikul and Tagbak and Duhul Semento in Indanan.

Puno said several barangays in the area have smaller Marines bases. There are six in Indanan (Datubato, Bud Tumatnagis, Timbayan, Itahan, Tugamod, and Laong Saing), four in Patikul (Taglibi, Maglibak, Quezon Beach, and Duhul sa Patikul), two in Parang (Igayo and Salipay), two in Maimbung (Batuhawa sa Matatal, and Tandu Patung), and one in Bud Bayug in Talipao.

Puno said: "That means we’re going to remove everybody from the southwest corner of Sulu…and if we remove everybody from there, then the civilians will be completely unprotected. Then he (Parad) said 100 CVOs (civilian volunteer organizations), medyo pahabol yan. They just came up with that additional demand."

NOWHERE TO GO

Puno said the bandits are somewhere in Mount Tucay in Indanan town and have nowhere else to go in Sulu province.

He said the bandits could not go south, west, or northeast because these are areas under the Moro National Liberation Front.

Puno said they are appealing to the crisis committee headed by Sulu Gov. Abdusakur Tan to contact Parad for the kidnappers to "rethink" their latest demand. He said the government had already "bent backwards" by accommodating the pullback demand so that negotiations for the safe release of the hostages could be resumed.

Security forces pulled out last Saturday from Indanan, Parang and a portion of Maimbung.

Puno made it clear the government would do its best "to save lives of hostages at the very last minute."

He said troops have pulled back and no one is within "striking distance."

"Ang position natin ngayon is that there’s nobody within four kilometers sniper distance from them… All the police auxiliaries are east of Maimbung. We are at a minimum of 10 to 15 kilometers away from the kidnappers. What else do you want? So, I cannot see the logic in their latest demand," he added.

THREAT SERIOUS

Sulu Vice Gov. Lady Ann Sahidulla, who had been tapped by the committee as negotiator, said the Abu Sayyaf is serious in its threat to behead one of the hostages.

The bandits had beheaded a number of hostages, including American-Peruvian Guillermo Sobero who was among 20 hostages they seized from the posh Dos Palmas resort in Puerto Princesa City eight years ago.

"If they see that the military is still there, they are not going to release a hostage... Once they see that they (troops) are no longer there, they themselves will check, and make a call to inform us they are going to release one (hostage)," she said.

On the likelihood the bandits would release a hostage if the five towns are cleared of security forces, Sahidulla said: "I think so. It’s positive because they want to prove that they mean what they are saying."

ICRC APPEAL

The ICRC reiterated its appeal to the Abu Sayyaf’s "sense of humanity."

"We are again appealing to the abductors’ sense of humanity and asking them to avoid taking any action that could endanger the lives of Mary Jean, Eugenio and Andreas," said Anastasia Isyuk, ICRC-Manila spokeswoman.

Isyuk declined to respond to questions on how the ICRC feels with only hours before the deadline set by the kidnappers.

"We do not want to dwell on those discussions. We want to focus on what we have at hand," she said.

BANDITS TESTING GOV’T

Press Secretary Cerge Remonde said the government is "not yielding Jolo" to the bandits.

"Ang pamahalaan ay gagawin ang makakaya niya para sana ma-save itong ating mga hostages. Pero may limitasyon po diyan sana naman ay talagang panalangin na lang muna ang manalig sa ASG at sa ating lahat," he said.

Sen. Rodolfo Biazon, a former Marines and AFP chief, asked the government not to give in.

"Definitely we cannot abandon the whole of Jolo on the say-so of a terrorist group," he said.

"If we do that… you continue to project to the terrorist group that your system is weak. I think that we are now witnessing a test by the terrorists of the government’s resolve in the implementation of its national policies on kidnapping situations," he added.

He said if the situation could not be resolved peacefully, "the only option left is to mount a rescue operation."

Rep. Edno Joson (Ind., Nueva Ecija) said the families of Abu Sayyaf bandits should also be kidnapped and held hostage as bargaining chips for the release of the ICRC workers.

"We should adopt the Israeli solution. Tit for tat, i-hostage din ang families ng Abu Sayyaf. Prisoner swap, in effect," he said.

Anak Mindanao Rep. Mujiv Hataman said an all-out offensive against the terrorist group might also put civilians in harm’s way.