There are about 7,000 brave soldiers in Jolo, Sulu to fight around the 400 to 500 members of the Abu Sayyaf group (ASG).
That in every ASG member is equivalent or versus to 14 soldiers.
This is the biggest force tapped against the Abu Sayyaf group since it was formed in the early 1990s, Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) Chief Gen. Ricardo Visaya said.
Visaya also said that one of the biggest challenges that the soldiers would encounter in fighting with ASG is dealing the unknown jungle of Sulu which the soldiers are not familiar, they are all coming from different places of the Philippines.
“But we can overcome as time goes by,” Visaya said.
Since the ASG has already established a good relationship with the people in the communities like they were giving money from ransom, they will be lacking the support from the people who are living there, Visaya added.
Visaya said he personally met with local chief executives to appeal to them so they won’t support the Abu Sayyaf group.
In a report told to CNN Philippines that the massive deployment of soldiers to fight against the Abu Sayyaf is not new anymore and it was also the strategy of the previous administrations and still failed to win or eliminate the ASG, Sulu Governor Toto Tan said.
In a report told to CNN Philippines that the massive deployment of soldiers to fight against the Abu Sayyaf is not new anymore and it was also the strategy of the previous administrations and still failed to win or eliminate the ASG, Sulu Governor Toto Tan said.
But the AFP is determined to accomplish the decades-old mission this time.
“The AFP is committed to use all the resources of the AFP para matapos na talaga ito,” Visaya said.
However, since last week there were already 15 soldiers and 30 Abu Sayyaf members were killed in the military operations.
AFP Spokesman BGen. Restituto Padila said on a report that because of this fight, at least 2,000 families or 6,000 individuals already been evacuated.
Government troops like the AFP, the Philippine National Police and the Coast Guard already met together on Monday to ensure the security in the country, Visaya stated.
Knowing Abu Sayyaf, though they are just a small group of people, the ASG is considered as the “most terrifying Muslim extremist group in the Philippines,” the international security analyst Prof. Rommel Banlaoi said.
The ASG are known doing ransom kidnappings, beheading hostages and bombings inside the country.
Source: CNNPH