Militants behead Filipino hostage in southern Philippines

MANILA: Islamist militants in the southern Philippines have beheaded a Filipino fishing boat captain who fell ill after his abduction four months ago, the military said Sunday.
Noel Besconde was beheaded on April 13 in the town of Patikul on the island of Jolo, 1,000km south of Manila, said Brigadier General Cirilito Sobejana, an anti-terrorism task force commander.
Besconde reportedly became sick after he was kidnapped in December and his captors, members of the Abu Sayyaf terrorist group, decided to execute him because he was slowing them down, Sobejana said.
Troops have not yet found Besconde's body, but Sobejana said the military has received a video of the beheading.
Besconde was captain of a fishing boat seized by the militants in waters off the southern Philippines in December.
His captors had demanded 3 million pesos (RM710,000) in ransom for his freedom. His beheading comes two days after a key Abu Sayyaf leader, Muammar Askali, was killed in a firefight with government troops in the central resort island of Bohol, where they allegedly travelled to conduct kidnappings.
Askali acted as the group's spokesman and was believed to have been behind the beheading of a 70-year-old German hostage in February and two Canadian captives in 2016.
Abu Sayyaf militants are still holding about 20 hostages, including 12 Vietnamese sailors, seven Indonesians and a Dutch man kidnapped in 2012, on the southern island of Jolo, their stronghold. — dpa