Malaysia arrests seven Filipinos suspected of Abu Sayyaf links
.Police in Malaysia have arrested seven suspected members of the Philippines-based Abu Sayyaf militant group.
National police chief Mohamad Fuzi Harun said on Thursday that the seven men, aged between 22 and 38, worked as security guards at private companies in and around the Malaysian capital, Kuala Lumpur.
“One suspect, a 22-year-old, was an Abu Sayyaf group member involved in clashes with the military and kidnapping of hostages in the southern Philippines,” he said in a statement, without giving details about the other suspects.
Harun said that the men had sneaked into Malaysia from eastern Sabah State, on Borneo Island, off the southern coast of the Philippines, in September 2015 and had used forged travel documents to fly to the capital city.
“The police will continue to launch operations to detect and catch foreign terrorist elements that infiltrate Malaysia,” the police chief stressed.
Earlier this month, Malaysian authorities arrested a notorious leader of the Abu Sayyaf militant group, Hajar Abdul Mubin, aka Abu Asrie, in an operation in Kuala Lumpur.
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