Our government is afraid of “backlash.” The Philippine government, evidently, is not afraid of “backlash.” An update on this story. “Philippines enraged as Islamists behead hostage,” from AFP, November 9 (thanks to Christopher):
ZAMBOANGA, Philippines (AFP) – The Philippine government on Monday vowed to take revenge against Al Qaeda-linked Islamic militants after they dumped the severed head of a kidnapped school principal at a petrol station.
The head of Gabriel Canizares was found inside a bag at the petrol station on the restive southern island of Jolo at dawn, 22 days after he was abducted, but the rest of his body remained missing, local police said.
The Abu Sayyaf had demanded a two-million-peso (42,000-dollar) ransom for the release of Canizares, but authorities and his relatives refused to pay.
President Gloria Arroyo’s office said the Abu Sayyaf, blamed for the country’s worst terrorist attacks and other beheadings of kidnap victims, was behind Canizares’ murder, and vowed tough action against the militants.
“We shall make them pay for the enormity of this savagery,” Arroyo’s spokeswoman, Lorelei Fajardo, said in a statement.
She said authorities were determined to “put an end to the Abu Sayyaf group’s heinous and inhumane atrocities”.
Arroyo had ordered the military and police units operating on Jolo and other Abu Sayyaf strongholds in the southern Philippines into “full swing” in an effort to crush them, according to Fajardo and the military….