Jihad in the Philippines update. The Philippines, you may recall, is one of those places that was left off a list of countries with “serious extremist movements,” recently drawn up by a putative Islamic expert. From AP, with thanks to Nicolei:
MANILA — Officers have arrested four suspected members of al-Qaida-linked terror groups who were planning to bomb an airport, malls and a church in the Philippines, police officials said Thursday.
Two Indonesians and a Malaysian, all suspected members of the regional Muslim terror group Jemaah Islamiyah, and a Filipino allegedly from the Abu Sayyaf extremist group, were arrested in southern Zamboanga city in December, but their detentions were not announced immediately to allow officials to track their companions, police officials said.
The arrests were to be officially announced later Thursday.
Police intelligence officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the men’s targets included a Roman Catholic church and the airport in the bustling port city of Davao and unspecified malls in Manila.
There were other possible targets in the southern cities of General Santos and Cagayan de Oro, they said. Some of the four were arrested at a wharf in Zamboanga after they came off a local ferry, the officials said.