Ex-Moro reb tagged in kidnap of Chinese

COTABATO CITY—Authorities on Wednesday pointed to a renegade Moro guerrilla leader as the head of a group of armed men that kidnapped two Chinese mining ore traders last Monday.

Captain Albert Caber, spokesperson of the Army’s 1st Infantry Division, said in an interview with a radio station here that Waning Abdusalam, a former member of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), was the leader of the group that kidnapped Jampong Lin-Yuankai, 38, and Jian Luo, 48, of Guandong, China on Monday in Kabasalan, Zamboanga Sibugay.

Caber said authorities still do not know where the captives are being kept.

He said the two Chinese are engaged in trading of manganese and copper ores and have been in Kabasalan since last year.

At least six men, who introduced themselves as National Bureau of Investigation agents, forced their way into the Chinese traders’ apartment a few meters from the town hall in Kabasalan and took the Chinese at gunpoint. Jeoffrey Maitem, Inquirer Mindanao