Vice-consul Bambang Gunawan of the Indonesian consulate in Davao City said they are trying to locate in Sulu the three missing children of Dulmatin and his wife Istiada B.T. Oemar Sovie. Gunawan did not identify the three missing children.
"Our government has been looking for the three other children of Dulmatin because they could not be found anywhere in Indonesia," Gunawan told The STAR.
Sovie alias Amenah Toha and her sons Edar, 6, and Alih, 8, are still in military custody in Zamboanga City pending their deportation.
Dulmatin and another Indonesian, Umar Patek, both wanted for the October 2002 Bali bombings that killed 202 people, are now hiding in Sulu under the protection of Abu Sayyaf chieftain Khadaffy Janjalani.
Military officials said Sovie and her sons are being held for violation of immigration laws but she is also under investigation for possible involvement in terrorist attacks.
Lt. Col. Bartolome Bacarro, Armed Forces public information office chief, said government troops conducted the raid at Sovie’s house in Barangay Sandah in Patikul after Bureau of Immigration officials issued a deportation order against Sovie following reports that Indonesian terrorists and their wives are hiding in Patikul.
Indon consul Gunawan said there are reports that Sovie took all of her five children with her when she went to Sulu to join Dulmatin.
Authorities believe that Sovie is requesting immigration not to deport her to Indonesia because her three children are still missing in Sulu.
Sovie is said to prefer detention in the Philippines to deportation.
Officials said Sovie does not want to leave behind her three other children who are believed to be under the care of Dulmatin’s sympathizers in Sulu.
Sovie had also claimed that her husband, Patek and Janjalani are still hiding in the jungles of Patikul, Sulu, after the military launched Oplan Ultimatum last Aug. 1 to track down Janjalani and the Indonesian bomb experts.
Gunawan said the three missing children are probably still in Sulu. Sovie brought all her children with her when she came to the Philippines through the so-called southern backdoor passage in the Indonesian-Philippine border in 2003.
Gunawan said Dulmatin’s children might already know how to speak Tausog, the local dialect in Sulu, because of their long stay in the province.