Zamboanga City, Philippines  - Muslim rebels of the Al-Qaeda-linked Abu Sayyaf group were behind the kidnapping of three members of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) on a southern Philippine island, the military said Friday.

First Lieutenant Esteffani Cacho, a regional military spokeswoman, said that based on initial field reports, it was the group of Abu Sayyaf commander Alpader Parad that seized the ICRC staff on Thursday on Jolo island, 1,000 kilometres south of Manila.

Taipei - Taiwan on Thursday began to check its security firewall after an employee in the presidential office and his friend were detained on suspicion of spying for China.

"President Ma Ying-jeou has instructed us to cooperate with the judicial investigation and to examine the integrity of our staff," Presidential Office spokesman Wang Yu-chi told a news conference.

He said that at this stage, the presidential office treats the incident as a judicial case, and refused to discuss details.

Jakarta - A court in Indonesia's Papua province on Thursday jailed five Australians for two and three years in prison for landing a plane illegally, a prosecutor said.

The five Australians were arrested in September after landing a small plane in the Papuan district of Merauke. The plane departed from Australia's Horn Island.

Judges at the Merauke district court sentenced the pilot, William Scott-Bloxam, to three years in prison and fined him 50 million rupiah (4,550 dollars), said prosecutor Rifky Firmansyah.

Zamboanga City, Philippines - Three members of the International Committee of the Red Cross, including a Swiss national, were abducted by unidentified gunmen in the southern Philippines on Thursday.

The Red Cross team was lead by Andrea Notter, a Swiss citizen, according to Lieutenant General Nelson Allaga, a regional military commander.

The identities of the other team members have not yet been confirmed.

Allaga said the Red Cross workers were supposed to board a flight out of Jolo island, 1,000 kilometres south of Manila, but they did not make it.

"We immediately issued an alarm, and hot pursuit is ongoing to track down the kidnappers," he said.

Madrid  - Recently, a man with his face partly covered by a cap and scarf entered room 537 at a hospital in the Spanish capital Madrid.

"Are you Leonidas Vargas?" he asked one of the two patients in the room with a South American accent. The patient pointed to the man sleeping in the other bed.

"Turn your back and keep quiet," the visitor instructed, turned towards the other patient, and shot him four times with a gun equipped with a silencer.

Phnom Penh - Cambodian police said on Wednesday they had arrested a Canadian man who allegedly sexually abused two young girls in the costal resort town of Sihanoukville.

Police arrested 68-year-old Daniel Lavigne on a tourist bus travelling from Sihanoukville to Phnom Penh on Monday after he allegedly sexually abused two sisters aged 10 and 12.

Regional migration police chief Som Saruen said Lavigne had confessed to "indecent acts" against the children but denied having sexual intercourse with them.