MANILA (AFP) - Australia is to donate 30 river boats to help the Philippine military pursue Bali bombing suspects who are alleged to have set up Islamic militant training camps in Mindanao, Defense Secretary Avelino Cruz said Monday.
The fast flatboats would allow the insertion of troops to go after Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) militants in marshlands on the large southern island.
The boats would help Filipino troops "get to the terrorists who may have bunkers in these marshlands," Cruz told the Foreign Correspondents Association here.
Canberra would procure the watercraft within three months under a bilateral agreement it signed with Manila, he added.
The planned donation was announced amid fears among Western security agencies that JI militants blamed for the two bombings on the Indonesian resort of Bali that killed more than 200 people, many of them Australians, have fled to the southern Philippines.
They alleged that the militants had been given shelter and training facilities by Muslim separatists waging a decades-old insurgency in Mindanao.
"The Jemaah Islamiyah threat is not a serious one at this point," Cruz said. However, "it has the potential to become a serious threat."
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