MICHAEL HOLMES, WORLD NEWS: Rebels holding 27 Philippine hostages are claiming responsibility for an abduction from a nearby tourist island off Malaysia that took place on Monday. Joining us now on the line is Abu Sabaya Ahmad, a spokesman for the rebel group holding the hostages. Sir, thanks for being with us. Could you tell us, first of all, the condition of the hostages.</s>ABU SABAYA AHMAD, REBEL SPOKESMAN: Well, the hostages I can tell you, there are people crying, shouting, you know.</s>HOLMES: What if your demands are not met? The United States isn't known for releasing prisoners in these circumstances.</s>SABAYA AHMAD: Well, we're demanding the release of Sheik Abdel- Rahman Omar and Abu Hydar (ph). The third one is Yousef Ramzi.</s>HOLMES: But what if those demands are not met, what if these people are not released?</s>SABAYA AHMAD: Well, it will give us problems. We will give them other problem.</s>HOLMES: What sort of problems?</s>SABAYA AHMAD: Well, like we are doing now. In every failure of the negotiations, we are going to behead each and every of the hostages.</s>HOLMES: How many hostages have been killed so far?</s>SABAYA AHMAD: So far, we have already beheaded two (ph) hostages.</s>HOLMES: And that you did make - your group made a threat to behead another five if the military action against your group is not stopped. What is your deadline for that? I think we seem to have lost the line. Are you still with us, sir? No, we seem to have lost the line. But we will try to re-establish it. END TO ORDER VIDEOTAPES AND TRANSCRIPTS OF CNN INTERNATIONAL PROGRAMMING, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE THE SECURE ONLINE ORDER FROM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Rebel Spokesman Abu Sayahmad On The Philippine Hostage Situation