News Digest

Three tourists abducted in southern Philippines by gunmen posing as travellers

Two Canadian tourists, a Norwegian resort manager and a Filipino woman have been kidnapped by unidentified gunmen from a popular resort island in the southern Philippines, the army has said. Philippines army Captain Alberto Caber said on Tuesday that the four were taken at gunpoint during a raid late on Monday night on the Oceanview resort on Samal Island, near Davao City, the largest city on Mindanao island in the restive southern Philippines. “Four people were taken but we do not know what group was behind the attack,” Caber said. The foreigners were later named as Kjartan Sekkingstad, a Norwegian national, John Ridsdel of Canada and his compatriot Robert Hall.

It appeared the foreigners were the targets, they were not taken at random.

Captain Alberto Caber

Nicolas Doire, a spokesman for Canada’s foreign ministry in Ottawa, said they were aware of the kidnapping but declined to comment or release information that “may compromise ongoing efforts and risk endangering the safety of the Canadian citizens abroad”. Philippine military sources said the gunmen spoke English and Tagalog, the language spoken widely in the Philippines. "Two Japanese tourists tried to intervene but failed,“ one of the sources said. The gunmen fled towards the Mindanao mainland with their captives, the source said. In 2001, al-Qaeda-linked Abu Sayyaf armed rebels tried, but failed to kidnap foreign tourists on Samal Island’s Pearl Farm resort. Three security men died fighting the attackers.