Page 83 - Conflict, Terrorism, and the Media In Asia

72 Benjamin Cole
al Qaeda ideology comes through in these reports. In local and community
newspapers such as the Sun Star Davao there is even less mention of bin Laden’s
statements. As a result, JI operatives, their sympathisers, and potential supporters,
have to rely on the internet to access the full text of al Qaeda statements.
There are indications, however, that media is not the primary means by which
JI is spreading its ideology. What seems to be of much greater importance to it is
gaining direct access to the fighters of the MILF and the ASG. It is by spreading
its ideology by personal contact that JI seems to be finding its recruits or at least
influencing them to perpetrate attacks that suit its objectives.
Since 2002 JI has been on the defensive following the arrest or killing of a number
of its operatives. Consequently, its recent activities have been low key, mainly using
the Philippines as a safe haven and training ground. Most media reports are of the
existence of JI cells operating in the country, JI’s links to indigenous Filipino groups,
alleged JI plans for attacks inside the Philippines, and the killing or arrest of JI mem-
bers. Even when there are no actual attacks by JI, this constant reporting creates the
sense that beneath the surface, JI remains active. More importantly, by constantly
reporting the links between al Qaeda, JI, the ASG and the MILF the media is link-
ing these indigenous conflicts to the ‘war on terror’. This suits JI’s objectives,
because it distances these indigenous groups even further from the government.
In reading the numerous reports about JI in the broadsheet Manila-based
newspapers, it is difficult to avoid the perception that it has a degree of influence
over the media agenda, which is out of proportion to the threat that it poses. It has a
much smaller presence in the Philippines than either the ASG, the MILF or the
NPA, with only around fifty operatives in central Mindanao in 2004
(Manila Bulletin 2004i), and the number of violent attacks or planned attacks attrib-
uted to JI is small compared to those of any of the indigenous Filipino groups.
Community newspapers such as the Sun Star provide a much better balance,
because they report the threats that are having a direct impact on their readership,
which are predominantly from the NPA, the MILF and the ASG. It seems that every
skirmish involving these groups is reported, whilst JI and al Qaeda receive little
attention. The high level of attention focused on JI by Manila-based broadsheets
seems to be a consequence of the high political profile which Arroyo has accorded
the group, which in turn seems to be a direct result of the pressure that the
government is under from the US to toe the line in the ‘war on terror’.

The Abu Sayyaf Group

Al Qaeda is most closely identified with the most notorious and violent of the
indigenous Filipino groups – the ASG. The group broke away from the MNLF in
1991 under the leadership of Abdurajak Abubakar Janjalani, who had been
trained in Afghanistan. He was subsequently killed in a gun battle with the police
in 1998. The goal of the group was the creation of an independent Islamic state
in Mindanao and the Sulu islands (BBC News Online 2005). It is notorious for
kidnapping Christians and foreigners for ransom, and for the extreme violence
that it employs. Among its worst atrocities were the abduction of more than fifty