Suspected Pakistani militant arrested in Philippines

Manila: Philippine security forces have arrested a suspected Pakistani bomb maker in the country's volatile south where Muslim militants are active, the national police chief said on Wednesday.

Police and military agents swooped down on a rented watch shop in Shariff Kabunsuan town on Mindanao island on Tuesday and arrested owner Muhammad Alfariz, said police Director General Jesus Verzosa.

Alfariz allegedly possessed mortar shells, wires, a cell phone and other bomb-making material, and may have already assembled several explosive devices, Verzosa said.

He said the suspect was being interrogated in connection with a plot to bomb several targets in Mindanao, where suspected Al Qaida-linked militants are based and Muslim separatist rebels have fought a decades-long insurgency.

Following weeks of surveillance a regional court issued a warrant for Alfariz's arrest after police convinced the judge that the suspect was keeping a cache of explosives in the shop, Verzosa said.

Details of the suspect's alleged affiliation with militants were murky, but police initially suspected he may have links with the Indonesian-based regional terrorist group Jemaah Islamiyah.

Security officials said last month that about 30 Indonesian recruits of Jemaah Islamiyah and 28 other extremists from unspecified countries are on the run in Mindanao.