Country Report on Terrorism 2021 - Chapter 5 - Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG)

Aka al Harakat al Islamiyya (the Islamic Movement)

Description:  The Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG) was designated as an FTO on October 8, 1997.  ASG split from the Moro National Liberation Front in the early 1990s and is one of the most violent terrorist groups in the Philippines.  The group claims to promote an independent Islamic state in western Mindanao and the Sulu Archipelago, and elements of the group have ties to ISIS’s regional affiliate, ISIS-Philippines.

Activities:  ASG has committed kidnappings for ransom, bombings, ambushes of security personnel, public beheadings, assassinations, and extortion.

Throughout 2015, ASG was responsible for multiple attacks, kidnappings, and the killing of hostages.  In 2016 and 2017 the group conducted kidnapping-for-ransom operations targeting Canadian, Filipino, German, and Norwegian citizens.  In 2017, ASG members killed nine persons and injured others in an attack on Basilan Island.  In 2018, ASG detonated a car bomb at a military checkpoint on Basilan Island, killing 10 people, including a Philippine soldier and pro-government militiamen.

In 2019, ASG militants attacked Philippine soldiers on Jolo, resulting in the deaths of two children.  That same year, ASG kidnapped two British nationals from a beach resort in the Zamboanga Peninsula region, but they were recovered on Jolo during the following month.  In August 2020, ASG killed more than a dozen persons and injured over 70 in twin suicide bomb attacks in Sulu province.

In 2021, Philippine authorities arrested several ASG members, including an ASG member involved in the abduction of two Canadians who were killed in 2016, an ASG bomb expert linked to the 2019 Jolo cathedral bombings, as well as an ASG member involved in a 2001 kidnapping on Basilan.

Strength:  ASG is estimated to have hundreds of members.

Location/Area of Operation:  The Philippines and Malaysia

Funding and External Aid:  ASG is funded primarily through its kidnapping-for-ransom operations and extortion.  The group may also receive funding from external sources, including remittances from overseas Filipino workers and Middle East-based sympathizers.  In the past, ASG also has received training and other assistance from regional terrorist groups such as Jemaah Islamiya.

Associated documents