Delicate Steps A solution to Manila's hostage crisis requires both carrot and stick Around and around it goes. Rampant poverty breeds political discontent, which eventually blows up into violence. The armed forces arrive, and angry people fight back.
Refugees cower in ditches.
The place is leveled, and crops and houses are destroyed. A peace is negotiated. All parties involved are relieved to expunge the episode from their minds - except those now more impoverished, nursing new resentments . . . In the southern Philippines, that vicious cycle is now in full flow. Rebel attacks and kidnappings that began in January led to army intervention.