Thursday, October 1, 2015

Samal kidnappers' vessel was tracked by new Navy system

From InterAksyon (Oct 1): Samal kidnappers' vessel was tracked by new Navy system




When Davao City Mayor Rody Duterte flew to Zamboanga City last week to follow up the kidnapping of three foreigners and a Filipina from a resort on Samal Island, he did not go there on empty speculation.

He was, in fact, holding solid information that the victims were no longer in the Davao region and had been taken to Sulu.

And, according to a very reliable source, the Philippine Navy was able to track, through its new Vessel Tracking System or VTS, a pump boat (motorized outrigger canoe) with the bow name “BAMA” the morning after the abduction of Norwegian resort manager Kjartan Sekkingstad, Canadians John Ridsdel and Robert Hall, and Hall’s Filipina girlfriend Maritess Flor.

The source said the fleeing vessel was also spotted by the skipper of a naval civilian service boat hugging the shoreline because of rough seas near Pundaguitan village in Governor Generoso town, Davao Oriental.

A naval intelligence report later indicated that “pings” from the mobile phone of one of the victims had been picked by a cellular site in Rio del Pilar, Glan, Sarangani, although it noted the location was uncertain and “could have been at sea … or on land.”

Commodore Rafael Mariano, commander of Naval Forces Eastern Mindanao would neither confirm nor deny the intelligence report, saying: “The protocol calls for information about the kidnappings released only through the PNP (Philippine National Police) joint task force headed by General Federico Dulay of PRO (Police Regional Office) 11.”

Dulay, in turn, referred queires to Superintendent Antonio Rivera, the regional police spokesman, who denied receiving the Navy intelligence report.

Duterte went to Zamboanga Friday and confirmed over his television program the following day that he received a verified report that the kidnappers and their victims arrived in Sulu 22 hours after leaving Samal.

This had also been confirmed to InterAksyon.com earlier by a police intelligence source who later said the victims are being held in Parang town and guarded by a “composite” unit of 200 Abu Sayyaf gunmen under the command of different sub-leaders.

The Navy’s VTS uses a global positioning system based on the reception of special satellite transmissions that allows personnel in the operations center to monitor and track the real-time location, speed and course of target vessels.

The system utilizes at least two powerful radar stations in the eastern side of Mindanao that are capable of picking up signals of naval vessels, one in the village of Kamanga in Maasim, Sarangani and the other in Davao Oriental.

These stations were set up reportedly with the technical assistance of the US Navy under the Visiting Forces Agreement.

According to the Navy, the VTS “is indispensable to the total force at sea and Fleet-in-being strategy, requires the real time picture of the operational environment and the available and deployable forces present in that area to execute a specific mission as the need arises.”

It is a complement to the Navy’s Coast Watch System, which monitors vessel traffic and can identify transiting vessels.

Sources said intelligence officials reportedly sought “American assistance” after receiving the Navy intelligence report but help came only on Wednesday.

http://www.interaksyon.com/article/118292/samal-kidnappers-vessel-was-tracked-by-new-navy-system

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