Terror bombings in the Philippines inspire Asean nations to hammer out counterterror accord

The New York Times is reporting that the ten countries that comprise the Southeast Asian Nations, or Asaen, responded to Wednesday's terror attacks in the Philippines by stepping up efforts to hammer out a regional antiterrorism agreement.

The agreement is supposed to facilitate the sharing of information and intelligence among the parties to it and encourage them to beef up their domest anti-terrorism laws as well.

Bombs went off in three southern Philippine cities in Mindanao on Wednesday, killing eight and wounding many times more. No group has claimed responsiblity yet, but Abu Sayyaf and Jemaah Islamiyah are the leading suspects.

As Wikipedia notes, Ramzi Yousef, the 1993 World Trade Center Bomber (and nephew of the 9/11 mastermind, KSM) is believed to have been associated with Abu Sayyaf. After he bombed Philippine Airlines Flight 434 in 1994, killing a Japanese passenger, an anonymous phone caller identifying himself as a member of Abu Sayyaf claimed responsibility for the bombing, stating, "We are [the] Abu Sayyaf Group. We explode[d] one plane from Cebu." The bombing is believed to have been a test run for Operation Bojinka, a plan to simultaneously explode a dozen jetliners over the Pacific that Yousef and KSM were trying to carry out before it was foiled by the Manila police in 1995.

Jemaah Islamiyah was the organization behind the Bali bombings in 2002 that killed some 200 people.