Following President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo's appeal to various groups to help solve the latest hostage crisis involving the Abu Sayyaf, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) has offered its assistance by helping to facilitate "negotiations" between the government and the Muslim rebel group.

"We are willing to solve this crisis in the spirit of goodwill, and all we ask from the government is to ask for our help through proper channels, such as a request to our central committee," MILF spokesman, Eid Kabalu, told Gulf News in an interview.

He said channelling the request through proper avenues "will avoid misconceptions about our intentions to help". "We are not interested in the P100m offer by Arroyo to anyone who can put an end to the Abu Sayyaf," he noted, as he referred to the bounty offered by the president. "Our solution is for the government and the Abu Sayyaf to sit and talk at the negotiating table and really find out what the other side wants.

"We are willing to broker the negotiations," he explained. A day after the abduction Arroyo announced that the government will not engage in any form of negotiations with the Abu Sayyaf, and she announced a P100m reward for any group or individual who can help nab the group notorious for its kidnapping activities. She also ordered the armed forces to safely rescue and "eliminate once and for all" the rebel group.

According to Kabalu, solving the crisis through "militarist" means, such as the current government approach, "will only embolden the Abu Sayyaf to create more trouble".

"While we condemn kidnapping as an un-Islamic act, the government should also consider that these actions by the Abu Sayyaf are just manifestations of deeper problems which cannot be solved through force of arms," Kabalu remarked.

"The government should learn from lessons of the past," he noted as he referred to the cycle of kidnappings by the Abu Sayyaf during which then president Joseph Estrada had ordered an all-out military offensive against the group at rebel bases in Sulu and Basilan.

Key leaders of the Abu Sayyaf such as Abu Sabaya, Khadafi Janjalani, Ghalib Andang and others managed to escape the offensive to lead the latest Palawan abductions.

The MILF is currently engaged in negotiations with the Philippine government to end more than three decades of secessionist war in the south, which is home to an estimated seven million Muslims belonging to different tribes. The government, however, regards the Abu Sayyaf as a band of bandits and has consistently avoided negotiations with the group.