Military: Bossi captors send emissary, seek to negotiate

By Joel Guinto
Last updated 03:03pm (Mla time) 06/25/2007

MANILA, Philippines -- (UPDATE) The abductors of Italian priest Giancarlo Bossi have approached a military official, through an intermediary, and offered to negotiate for the cleric’s freedom, an official said Monday.

But Marine Major General Ben Dolorfino said he had asked the intermediary to tell kidnappers to produce "proof of life" for the 57-year-old Italian clergyman before talks can start.

The military and Muslim separatist rebels have been looking for Giancarlo Bossi in thick forests since suspected criminals snatched him two weeks ago.

"I told them, they must present a proof of life," Dolorfino told reporters in Camp Aguinaldo.

He described the group who approached him as concerned citizens tapped by local leaders to help the military find Bossi.

Dolorfino said the abductors must quickly prove that Bossi was alive by allowing the priest to phone him or any military official. The contact promised to relay Dolorfino's message to the abductors.

Dolorfino said he believed Bossi was still alive and being held near the boundary of Lanao del Sur and Lanao del Norte provinces.

Bossi was kidnapped in Payao town, Zamboanga Sibugay province last June 10 while on his way to mass. He was the parish priest there.

Dolorfino said no ransom had been discussed, but the contact asked for money to buy medicines for Bossi, who suffers from hypertension.

Dolorfino said Moro Islamic Liberation Front rebels, who have ears on the ground and are interested in helping free Bossi, continued to concentrate their forces in the area where Bossi was believed to be held.

Bossi's fellow Italian priests in the southern Philippines from the Rome-based Pontifical Institute for Foreign Missions said they have not been contacted by the abductors.

There was speculation in the local media that the abductors were in touch with the mission because a picture showing a white man's feet in a grassy area next to a rifle was posted on a Web site put up by the priests.

"We do not have any information about this picture," Italian priest Sebastian Dambra said. "We concluded that somebody put this there on their own initiative, but there is no connection with this case."

Dolorfino said the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) has identified the mastermind behind the kidnapping, but he said the information was still subject to verification.

Asked to name the brains behind the abduction, Dolorfino said: "Without the account of witnesses, we could not just name them."

Meanwhile, military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Bartolome Bacarro said reports reaching the Armed Forces Western Mindanao Command (Wesmincom) showed that Bossi was being kept in Zamboanga Sibugay province.

Earlier, the military, guided by the separatist Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), had zeroed in on the boundary of Lanao del Norte and Lanao del Sur provinces in search of Bossi.

Bacarro said simultaneous pursuit operations were underway in Zamboanga Sibugay, and in Lanao.

Bossi is the third Italian priest to be kidnapped by bandits in the Zamboanga peninsula since Reverend Luciano Benedetti was kidnapped in 1998 and Giuseppe Pierantoni. Both were released by their captors.