US maintains travel ban on Basilan, Sulu,Tawi-Tawi

ZAMBOANGA CITY — The United States has maintained the travel warning it issued to its citizens to avoid traveling to Basilan, Sulu and Tawi-Tawi due to existing threat from the al-Qaeda-linked Abu Sayyaf group.

The travel warning issued by the US Embassy on Tuesday last week also advised Americans to defer non-emergency travel to the island of Mindanao and Sulu archipelago, citing recurrence in bombings incidents and threats of other violence and criminal acitivities, including kidnapping.

"A number of security-related incidents highlight the risk of travel in certain areas due to incidents of kidnapping, bombings, and other violence and criminal activity," the US advisory stated. "The terrorist threat to American citizens in the Philippines remains high," it added.

It disclosed that the Abu Sayyaf, tagged by the government to have links with the Indonesian-based terror group, Jemaah Islamiyah (JI), continues to issue public threats against US citizens and interests in the country.

The extremist groups in the region have demonstrated a capability to carry out transnational attacks in locations where Westerners and foreigners congregate. The latest attack in the south was the abduction of three foreigners — an Indonesian and two Malaysians — who are crew members of the tugboat M/L Ocean.

Philippine navy forces scouring the border islands in the southern tip of Mindanao clashed with the bandits last week, killing three of its members and capturing seven others.

Although the Philippine government has been engaged in on and off in negotiations with communist rebels and the Muslim separatist Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), rebel activity and armed banditry in certain areas in the country still pose security problems, according to the US latest travel warning. — Roel Pareño