It was hell out there, Sayyaf hostages say

ISABELA, Basilan -- "Vengeance," said the children.

Most children whom Army Scout Rangers had rescued after 44 days in captivity want to exact revenge against the terrorist band Abu Sayyaf.

"I hope the soldiers wipe them out because they are evil," 12-year-old Ma. Cristina Francisco said in Filipino.

She was sitting alone in a far corner of a hospital ward, nursing swollen feet caused by bruises sustained from walking barefoot in the jungles of Basilan.

"They (Abu Sayyaf terrorists) had no mercy," she said while biting her lips to restrain her anger. "They kicked us whenever we stopped walking."

Cristina had dreamed of becoming a teacher, but the hell she went through in the hands of the Abu Sayyaf has changed her mind and she now wants to become a soldier.

"I want to join the military when I grow up," she said in between tears.

Cherie Vergara, 14, who was wounded by shrapnel in the left arm, said the guerrillas' wives also showed no mercy to the captives whether young or old.

"They kept on kicking us," she said in Filipino. "The wife of Pah Imam ordered that we be beheaded because she said we have become a burden to them."

Sixteen-year-old Ricardo Gregorio said the guerrillas were only good in the beginning of the hostages' captivity and that they were actually evil men.

"Abu Sabaya (Abu Asmad Salayuddin, Abu Sayyaf spokesman) said that we will be beheaded once we reach Jolo," he said in Chavacano.

He said that he pretended to be interested to join the Abu Sayyaf to get the terrorists' sympathy and so he would not be killed in case they decided to push through with the decapitation of the hostages.

The children said they were given food only once a day after they were kidnapped by the Abu Sayyaf and taken to their hideout in the mountains of Basilan.

Gregorio said most of the relief goods intended for the captives were given by the guerrillas to their families, but that they were first made to taste the food to ensure that these were not poisoned.

"They even stripped Robin (Padilla) of his personal belongings," he said.

Gregorio said the terrorists also told them to say only good things about the Abu Sayyaf, especially to visiting journalists who were with the group of action star Robin Padilla.

Vergara, on the other hand, said the terrorists took the hostages' personal belongings like clothes and slippers and gave them to their families.

Gregorio said the clothes that the Red Cross had brought did not even reach the hostages because they were also given to the guerrillas' families.