Matriarch linked to siege of city where Isil ‘recruiting children’ to expand terror
A POWERFUL matriarch has emerged as one of the alleged kingpins behind the assault on a Philippine city that may herald the expansion of the Isil terrorist group across southeast Asia.
Farhana Maute, 60, is suspected of funding the Maute terror group operated by her two sons, Omarkhayam and Abdullah, that has held Marawi, a majority-muslim city of 200,000 in the southern Philippines, under a brutal siege against government troops for the past month.
Mrs Maute, described as a wealthy businesswoman and political kingmaker from the well-respected Romato clan, is also reported to have used her influential status to recruit militants, some of them children, to join her notorious sons’ operations.
In an interview with local online news network Rappler, a former child soldier claimed that Mrs Maute and her husband had duped his impoverished parents into sending him to their headquarters in Butig, 30 miles from Marawi, to study the Koran.
Instead, he was allegedly given a rifle and brainwashed to kill government soldiers. He was taught that if he perished in battle, he would go to heaven. “I was ready to die,” he said.
The teenager, who remains anonymous, said some of his friends would now be fighting in the besieged city.
His claims were backed up by a video obtained by Rappler, which shows young boys practising martial arts moves with masked men.
Multiple witnesses fleeing the battle-torn city also testified to the presence of child soldiers.
Zia Alonto Adiong, an aid worker whose own ancestral Marawi home was destroyed in a military air strike last week, said he had seen 16 to 20 children flaunting heavy-duty guns in his neighbourhood.
Terrorists had recruited them from unregulated madrassas operating outside the state education system, he claimed.
“During the early days of the war, you would see 9- to 11-year-olds manning checkpoints, holding heavy firearms. We’re not talking only boys, there are several girls,” he said.
“They are running errands, following orders from their commanders… checking all civilians moving out from this area. We presume that some of these children already died in air strikes.”
Mrs Maute was caught this month in a vehicle loaded with weapons, and is now facing charges of rebellion.
So far 375 people, including 26 civilians, have died in Marawi, which was overrun on May 23 after a botched attempt to arrest Isnilon Hapilon, the leader of the Abu Sayyaf terrorist group, who was earlier named the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil) emir for Southeast Asia.
A senior military commander said on Saturday that Hapilon, who is one of America’s most wanted terrorists, may have slipped out of the city in recent days.
An eight-hour ceasefire allowing residents to celebrate the end of Ramadan came to an abrupt end yesterday afternoon as the government continued its offensive. Assaults backed by air and artillery bombardment had stopped at the start of Islamic prayers at 6am, but gunfire broke out as soon as the truce ended around 2pm, AFP reporters in Marawi said.
Lt Gen Carlito Galvez, the regional military commander, said the truce also allowed five Muslim religious leaders to enter “ground zero” and negotiate with the militants to release civilian hostages, especially children, women and the elderly.
About 300,000 civilians have been displaced so far, and up to 1,000 may still be in the battle zone.
The assault was led by the Maute group – also affiliated to Isil – whose decision to join forces with Abu Sayyaf, and ability to hold territory, has sparked fears that Isil is using a power vacuum in the southern Philippines to set up a regional stronghold.
A decision by Rodrigo Duterte, the Philippine president, to impose martial law on Marawi and the surrounding province of Mindanao has failed to break the siege or assuage the fears of neighbouring countries.
Last week the Philippines, Malaysia and Indonesia began trilateral naval patrols to curb the expansion of local Islamist terror groups.
Singapore has raised its terror threat level to the highest in recent years amid news that Isil supporters have claimed the city state as part of its East Asian territory.
In interviews with The Telegraph, influential residents of the southern Philippines built up a picture of an isolated and neglected region, overrun by illicit criminal networks, rival clans and Muslim separatist groups.
They said bad governance and poverty had driven recruits to join armed insurgents and opened up the way for extremists to take control.
Mr Adiong, the aid worker, said the biggest fear was that foreign terrorists would arrive by sea to attack other cities in Mindanao. Foreigners from as far afield as Yemen and Chechnya, as well as from neighbouring countries, are believed to be fighting in Marawi.
Hussein Datuharun, a city official, said foreign fighters had sneaked into the city months before the attack. “They rented houses in order to get a good advantage,” he said. Weapons were easily obtained from the lawless badlands of Mindanao.
The Maute brothers were educated in the Middle East, but it is uncertain when they morphed from scions of a wealthy family with alleged criminal connections into hardened Islamists.
“We can all agree that these people had some kind of ideological leanings,” said Joseph Franco, a counterterrorism expert at Singapore’s Nanyang Technological University.
But he said that the current pattern of recruitment across Mindanao was more material-driven than based on ideology.
Deprived youths signed up to the Maute and Abu Sayyaf groups, enticed by the lucrative nature of their kidnapfor-ransom crimes. “It’s not about the afterlife, it’s all about the here and now, how to transform that ransom money into a better life,” he said.
‘She is said to have used her influence and status to recruit militants, some of them children, to join her notorious sons’ operations’
‘The assault has sparked fears that Isil is using a power vacuum in the southern Philippines to set up a regional stronghold’