8 killed in Hong Thai bus hostage crisis
Confirmation from President Benigno Aquino that eight tourists were killed, while the Red Cross reported seven were in hospital with unspecified injuries.
Nine hostages, which include children, were released at different times during the day from the bus that was parked at Rizal Park, a popular tourist destination just a few blocks from police headquarters.
The Filipino bus driver was able to escape by jumping out of a window and after that the assault team stormed the vehicle, with his escape and the rest of the crisis broadcast live on television.
Negotiations was trampled down after nightfall when the gunman, former senior police inspector Rolando Mendoza, began shooting and commandos were forced to attack the bus, firing dozens of bullets of their own into the vehicle.
"I shot two Chinese. I will finish them all if they do not stop," Mendoza told a local radio station as the police assault was about to get under way.
According to police, a sniper shot Mendoza dead as he used his captives as "human shields" in the final moments of the 12-hour standoff.
One of the survivors criticized the Philippine authorities, saying they acted too slowly.
"There were so many people on the bus—no one came to our rescue. Why?" the woman, who identified herself as Mrs Leung, said at the scene in comments broadcast on Hong Kong’s Cable TV.
"We were in fear for so many hours. I find it really cruel."
Aquino said the authorities had initially believed Mendoza would surrender, suggested by the release of some of the hostages, however the situation later diminished.
After 10 hours or more of waiting to launch their assault, police were having a difficulty to get inside the bus for another 90 minutes.
They surrounded the bus, smashing its windows and fired at it, but Mendoza held them off by shooting back.
The hostage crisis eventually stopped when police finally threw tear gas inside the bus, and fired again.
"He used the tourists as human shields. But he panicked and retreated to the front of the bus. He was then met with a volley of gunfire," the assault team’s leader Superintendent Nelson Yabut told reporters.
An ex-commander of France’s elite hostage rescue unit slammed the police assault as "badly prepared and risky."
The officers who attacked the bus obviously did not have enough training and "visibly lacked adequate equipment and tactical competence," said Frederic Gallois, the former head of France’s National Gendarmerie Intervention Group.
Mendoza, 55, before was honored by police chiefs in 1986 as one of the top 10 officers in the country.
However he was discharged in 2008 for his supposed involvement in drug-related crimes and extortion and hijacked the bus in an appeal to clear his name, according to police.
"He wants to be reinstated in the service," Manila district police chief Superintendent Rodolfo Magtibay said early in the day.
Joseph Tung, executive director of the Travel Industry Council of Hong Kong, said the tourists, aged between four and 72, were on a three-day tour with Hong Thai Travel due to end on Monday.
The Hong Kong government sent out its warning to all its citizens to avoid travelling to the Philippines, and expressed grief over the killings.
"It is a tragedy because a pleasure trip has ended up with casualties and injuries," Hong Kong Chief Executive Donald Tsang told a press briefing.
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