DAVAO CITY—President Rodrigo Duterte on Friday admitted he once admired the Abu Sayyaf when it was still fighting for a cause, particularly for the Bangsamoro people.
But then, he said, the bandit group lost his trust when it started killing people, including beheading them in front of the camera.
“You are here slaughtering people as if they are chickens,” he said, citing Wednesday’s beheading of 18-year-old Patrick Almodovar.
He said now that the Abu Sayyaf lost his trust, he had ordered the military and the police to “destroy them because they are criminals.”
Duterte said it was pointless to talk with the Abu Sayyaf because “we will never have peace in that area even if you give them autonomy.”
“Kill them, destroy them,” he said of his order to the police and the military.
Duterte said the government had all the resources to annihilate the Abu Sayyaf and finish the group in a week’s time.