In June 2020, "Inquirer" newspaper reported the killing of Mamay Aburi by government troops in Titay, Zamboanga Sibugay after authorities attended to serve a warrant of arrest. Aburi was allegedly a subleader of a kidnap-for-ransom group and had been linked with the Abu Sayyaf Group based in Sulu. The provincial director of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG) said Aburi was involved in the 2011 kidnapping of Australian national Warren Rodwell and the 2019 abduction of the Hyrons couple in Tukuran, Zamboanga del Sur. In February 2021, "The Manila Times" reported that Abu Sayyaf subleader Arrasid Halissam was shot dead when he opened fire on police serving a warrant on him in the village of Santa Maria, Zamboanga City. Halissam was linked to numerous kidnappings such as Australian adventurer Warren Rodwell, Americans Gerfa Lunsmann and son Kevin, Chinese Yuan Lin Kai and Jian Luo, South Korean Nwi Seong Hong, and almost a dozen Filipinos. Halissam was also allegedly involved in the 2015 bombing in Zamboanga that killed two people and injured over fifty others.