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Headless body of murdered kidnapped victim found in S. Philippines

Xinhua, July 2, 2016 Adjust font size:

The headless body of a Canadian man who was killed by Abu Sayyaf militants last month has been found, a military spokesman said Saturday.

Filemon Tan of the military's western Mindanao Command said in a statement that soldiers found the body, believed to be that of Robert Hall, around 11:35 a.m. Saturday in a shallow grave in the remote village of Talipao town, Sulu.

Hall's severed head was recovered June 13 inside a plastic bag left near a Roman Catholic church in Jolo, Sulu a few hours after he was beheaded by the Abu Sayyaf militants.

Last April, the Abu Sayyaf group also beheaded Canadian national John Ridsdel. The victim's head was found near a police station inside the town hall premises also in Jolo.

Ridsdel, Hall, Norwegian Kjartan Sekkingstad and a Filipino woman were snatched in a posh holiday resort in Davao del Norte in Sept. 21 last year. The woman was freed late last month.

The militants are still holding Sekkingstad.

Formed in the early 1990s, the Abu Sayyaf is a radical offshoot of a Muslim separatist insurgency in the south of the mainly Catholic Philippines. Endit