|
ZAMBOANGA CITY: Tribesmen seized two Canadians and four Filipino
surveyors of a Swiss mining firm, but freed them later on a remote
village in Mindanao after divesting them of their equipment and
money.
Canadians Deth Triesen, 23, and Andrei Argamomob,
45, were freed late Tuesday afternoon along with their Filipino
assistants Madong Turo, Johnny Malid Abundio Tanedo and Loreto
Blanco in Kiblawan town in Davao del Sur province.
“Police forces are now tracking down the
suspects,” Chief Inspector Querubin Simeon Manalang, the regional
police spokesman, told The Manila Times.
The six are workers of the Sagittarius Mines
Inc. (SMI), in Tampakan town in Davao del Sur.
Manalang said three B’laan tribesmen seized
the surveyors after flagging down their vehicle in the remote
Kiblawan village of Tacub. “They were briefly held, about two and
a half hours, after the bandits thought the victims were carrying
huge amount of money and freed them unharmed,” Manalang said.
He said the natives also confiscated the
surveyors’ geophysics equipment and computers, but returned them
to its owners later Tuesday after a series of negotiations.
Manalang said many armed groups are also
operating in the province, including the communist New People’s
Army (NPA), which had previously attacked the SMI.
B’laan tribesmen are opposing the mining
operations in the province, saying it is destroying their ancestral
lands.
Police have already identified two of the three
tribesmen who held the surveyors as Yot Salute and Pokok Betil.
In January, communist rebels raided the mining
firm in Tampakan town and torched buildings and equipment.
The NPA accused SMI of plunder, land grabbing
and environment destruction, and said the attack was a punishment.
The rebels said the raid was in response to a longstanding demand of
indigenous people to put a stop to the firm’s operations in the
area.
Indigenous tribes were protesting the operation
of the SMI, saying the mining activities allegedly encroached into
ancestral lands and caused pollution in rivers and streams in
Tampakan, which is considered a watershed area. But it is believed
to be one of the world’s “best new large-scale copper gold
mines,” with an estimated 11.6 million tons of copper and 14.6
million ounces of gold.
SMI is partly owned by Xstrata, one of the
world’s largest mining companies based in Switzerland.
Rebel forces have previously raided other mining
firms in Mindanao that refused to pay illegal taxation.
Last year, NPA forces also attacked a private
coal-mining firm, the MG Mining Company, in Raja Kabunsuan village
in Surigao del Sur’s Lingig town.
The Philippines’ largest Muslim rebel group,
the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), also warned mining firms
to stay away from ancestral lands in Mindanao.
MILF rebels have previously attacked and killed
13 Filipino miners working for the Calgary-based TVI in Zamboanga
del Norte province after they ignored warnings to stop operation in
Mount Canatuan in Siocon town, a sacred altar to an indigenous tribe
called the Subanon, whose ancestors settled in the area centuries
ago.
|
