Boy saved from Abu Sayyaf shot dead

ZAMBOANGA CITY, Philippines—Ten-year-old Bingol Palaraw was to return to school as a Grade 1 pupil this June, but hopes for a better future ended when he was shot and killed while coming out of the premises of an Arabic school in Tipo-tipo in Basilan province on Monday night.

Palaraw was rescued from being a child soldier of the Abu Sayyaf terrorist group last year. Known to people close to him as Boyong, he had always wanted to finish college, according to Lt. Col. CJ Paolo Perez, commander of the Army’s 18th Infantry Battalion.

The boy was also looking forward to playing football, Perez said.

Boyong was coming out of the madrasa in Barangay (village) Poblacion in Tipo-tipo around 7 p.m. when a lone man casually approached him and shot him several times with a .45 cal. pistol, the official said.

He died instantly, Perez said. But he could not say if Boyong was executed by the Abu Sayyaf group led by Puruji Indama.