Executive Summary

Kidnapping remains a persistent problem in the Philippines. In recent years, the presence of a large online gambling industry has been one of the main shapers of the nature of kidnapping in the country. Philippine Offshore Gaming Operators (POGOs), mostly owned by corporations based in China, have been embroiled in numerous kidnapping incidents since the sector’s boom in 2017. The contraction of the POGO industry during the COVID-19 pandemic corresponds to a decline in POGO-related kidnapping incidents since 2021. However, PSA continues to record POGO-related kidnapping incidents month-on-month to the present time. The outlawing of the POGO industry in the Philippines, effective December 2024, is expected to contribute to the further decline of explicitly POGO-related abductions in the country.

Despite the relative decline in explicitly POGO-related kidnapping incidents, PSA still observed a consistent trend of Chinese syndicate abductions throughout 2024. Ethnic Chinese nationals make up the bulk of foreign victims abducted in the past year, and most of these victims were abducted by ethnic Chinese suspects.

Notable incidents of this kind reflect a modus operandi being employed by professional kidnapping syndicates that involve luring ethnic Chinese businesspeople into countries like the Philippines under the guise of a potential business or investment. The kidnap-for-ransom of two Chinese and Chinese-American medical technology executives in June, one of the most notable incidents for 2024, underscored the continuing prevalence of this modus operandi. Nonetheless, PSA notes that these incidents occur within a larger global context and are not specific to the Philippines. The risks associated with these kinds of incidents are still largely confined within the ethnic Chinese diaspora and there is no evidence suggesting that these syndicates have been targeting local or foreign businesspeople of other ethnicities.

PSA did not record any Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG) abductions for the third straight year. However, PSA also recorded the first abduction in Mindanao targeting a Caucasian American national in four years. The kidnapping of Elliot Eastman in Zamboanga del Norte suggests that an elevated risk of violent crime, including kidnapping, persists in the country’s frontier regions, historically associated with the ASG and other Islamist threat actors. It also underscores the fluidity of violent threat actors’ affiliations and motivations along the criminal-to-terrorist spectrum.

Nonetheless, PSA maintains that the threat of ASG kidnapping remains much lower than it was when the group was at its peak, with significantly diminished operational capabilities and a lack of leadership. The elevated maritime and coastal activity PSA recorded in 2018 appeared to show the ASG attempting to rebuild some of its lost capacity, but continued pressure by security forces on land and ever-increasing monitoring capabilities by air and sea appear to have continued to frustrate the ASG’s efforts. The ASG’s activities continue to be geographically constrained – they operate predominantly around the Zamboanga peninsula and in the Sulu Sea between Mindanao and Sabah (including the ASG bailiwicks of Basilan, Jolo, and Tawi-Tawi).