MANILA, Philippines — Al-Qaida-linked militants released one of three Red Cross hostages, a Filipino woman, today after 10 weeks in jungle captivity on a southern island, the defense chief announced. There was no word about the two others — a Swiss and an Italian.
Defense Secretary Gilbert Teodoro said on nationwide television that Mary Jean Lacaba, 37, was safe in the hands of a southern military commander and the vice governor of Jolo island, where the trio have been threatened with beheading earlier this week.
“She’s alive and well,” said Sen. Richard Gordon, head of the Philippine Red Cross. “I’m really very elated. I’m so happy and had a good cry.”
Doctors were checking Lacaba at a Jolo military camp, he said.
“I hope we can get the other two,” Gordon added.
He said that he had received information earlier today that Italian Eugenio Vagni and Swiss Andreas Notter were seen alive, and that one of them was walking with a cane.
In the first footage of Lacaba, shown on GMA-7 television, she was being pushed in a wheelchair to a trauma clinic in the Jolo military camp. She was wearing a red headdress and talking on a cell phone.
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