Malaysian forces in massive hunt for Abu Sayyaf gunmen

Malaysian security forces at the resort. The Star Online-Asia News Network

SEMPORNA — Malaysian security forces have launched a massive hunt for gunmen who grabbed two women – a tourist from China and a Filipino resort worker – along the sea borders with southern Philippines.

Security officials said that they were checking out possible escape routes of the gunmen who apparently grabbed the 29-year-old Gao Hua Yuan from Shanghai, China and a Filipino Marcy Dayawan, after the armed group landed at the resort around 10.:30 pm Wednesday.

The gunmen were believed to be from the Abu Sayyaf, a Filipino militant Muslim group that has been implicated in seaborne kidnappings for ransom in the region before, said a Philippine intelligence official who didn’t give his name because he was not authorized to speak to the media.

Immediate cut off operations were launched by the security forces and their counterparts in southern Philippines were also alerted for the group believed to have used a pump boat that came alongside the 60-room Singahmata Reef Resort.

However, sources told The Star that security forces on both sides of the border have yet to receive any sightings of the group though they suspect that the groups had managed to slip out in the cover of darkness to the island chain of Tawi Tawi in southern Philippines.

Wednesday’s kidnapping came a day after (April 1) marking the first year of the setting up of Eastern Sabah Security Command (ESSCOM) following the intrusion of Kg Tanduo in Felda Sahabat 17 in Lahad Datu on December 12 last year.

A similar styled kidnapping occurred on November 15 at Pom Pom Island Resort in Semporna where a Taiwanese businessman Li Min Shu, 58, was killed and his wife Chang An Wei, 57, was kidnapped by gunmen.

She was subsequently released after 36-days for an unknown ransom paid through negotiations with the gunmen who held her in the Abu Sayaff stronghold of Jolo in the southern Philippines.

The latest kidnapping comes in the shadow of Malaysia’s spending its security efforts on search of its missing MH 370 flight. With a report from The Associated Press

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