Negotiators hopeful Sino to be freed this week

COTABATO CITY — Negotiators are optimistic that the kidnappers of a Chinese national being held somewhere in Maguindanao will release him this week.

The Council of 15, the new central leadership of the Moro National Liberation Front, along with emissaries of Presidential Assistant for Mindanao Jesus Dureza and North Cotabato Gov. Emmanuel Piñol, is negotiating the release of Zhang Zhung Yi, who was snatched along with his interpreter, Edwin Lim, in Columbio, Sultan Kudarat last August.

"We have received confirmation that the victim is very much alive and in good health. We hope his captors will release him soon so he can return to China and be reunited with his family," said Cotabato City Mayor Muslimin Sema, MNLF secretary-general and a member of the Council of 15.

Last Sept. 27, the kidnappers, led by Tahir Alonto, released Lim to Sema and Presidential Assistant for Special Concerns Norberto Gonzalez following three-day negotiations at a hinterland area at the boundary of Columbio and Datu Paglas town in Maguindanao.

Sema said they are hoping that the kidnappers will release Zhang this week, as they promised.

The consul general of the Chinese Embassy said last week he was optimistic that Zhang, held captive by the Alonto-led "Pentagon" kidnapping syndicate, will be freed safely soon.

Lim and Zhang, along with two other foreigners, Wang Sheng-li and Xue Xing, were abducted while about to pay the Pentagon group a P5-million ransom in exchange for the release of Zhang’s older brother, Zhang Zhung Quiang.

The older Zhang, operations manager of the Chinese contractor of the P3.4-billion Malitubog-Maridagao irrigation project in Carmen, North Cotabato, and Xue were gunned down by their captors during a chance encounter with soldiers in Barangay Upper Bunawan in Columbio last Aug. 12.

The Pentagon, according to police and military intelligence sources, has asked for "immunity from suit" and a P10-million ransom in exchange for the release of Zhang Zhung Yi. — John Unson