MANILA, May 17 Kyodo sway troops...

MANILA, May 17 Kyodo

sway troops on Saturday rescued sum of two units women who were held hostage by way of Muslim extremist rebels in the southern Philippines, President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo said.

Arroyo said marine soldiers rescu Nora Bendijo and Flor Montulo after they escaped from the Abu Sayyaf rebels around 830 a.m. in the brake village of Buhanginan in Patikul town, Sulu Province.

Jolo island military chief Brig. Gen Alexander Aleo said the two hostages ''are now in our custody.''

The rescu hostages and pair other women members of the Jehovah's Witnesses were kidnapped in June last year in Patikul town.

The Abu Sayyaf rebels are still holding captive another Filipino, Roland Ullah, who was among 21 Asian and European holidaymakers kidnapped at the Abu Sayyaf from the resort island of Sipadan in Sabah, Malaysia, in 2000

The U has linked the Abu Sayyaf to the kidnapping and killing last year of American missionary Martin Burnham and Guillermo Sobero, who was beheaded in June 2001 in Basilan Island in the southern Philippines.

Abu Sayyaf is believed to be linked to Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida terror network. It is the smaller still more radical of two Muslim rebel clusters fighting for an independent Islamic state in the southern Philippines.

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