MAJOR concerns remain about the wellbeing of Fr Michael Sinnott despite the release of a video by his kidnappers in the Philippines at the weekend, according to Foreign Affairs Minister Micheál Martin.

The elderly Irish priest snatched by a kidnap gang in the Philippines is believed to be alive and has received vital medicine for a heart problem, it emerged today.

KIDNAPPED Irish priest Michael Sinnott is in critical condition due to malnutrition and lack of medicine for his heart condition.

THE Philippine military said yesterday it knows where a kidnapped elderly Irish priest is being held on a remote southern island and contact had been made with his abductors to get the hostage lifesaving medicine.

Suspected Muslim guerrillas detonated a bomb near a Roman Catholic cathedral in the southern Philippines today, killing at least three people and wounding more than two dozen others.

At least 5,000 villagers have fled their homes in nearly a week of sporadic clashes between Muslim guerrillas and pro-government militiamen in the southern Philippines, rebels and officials said today.

A key suspect in terror attacks that killed 42 people in the Philippines last year has been arrested with two associates, a senior military official in the country said today.

A bomb exploded today at a crowded market, killing at least 13 people, in the latest deadly attack in the southern Philippines, officials said.

A bomb blast at a market in the southern Philippines today killed at least five people, the police said.

A POWERFUL bomb hidden in a backpack exploded yesterday at an airport in the southern Philippines, killing at least 19 people and wounding 147, authorities said.

A powerful bomb hidden in a backpack killed at least 17 people today when it ripped through a crowd outside an airport in the southern Philippines.

Nine people were killed in a New Year’s Eve grenade attack in the southern Philippines, including a 14-year-old.

Suspected Muslim rebels ambushed local employees of a Canadian mining company in the southern Philippines, killing 12 and injuring 10.

The death toll from a Christmas Eve bomb attack outside the home of the Mayor of a town in the southern Philippines rose to 16 today, as authorities searched for clues in the blast.

A Christmas Eve bomb attack by suspected Islamic militants has killed at least 13 people in the southern Philippines.

Muslim separatists have accused Philippine troops of violating a cease-fire agreement by attacking the home of a rebel leader in the country's south.

Soldiers have killed at least nine members of a kidnapping gang that seized an Italian missionary and two Chinese engineers in the southern Philippines last year.

A Muslim separatist group in the Philippines today said it believed an American hostage was alive despite claims of another rebel group that they beheaded him.

The military in the Philippines say they are closing in on rebels who have kidnapped six-year-old Eiman Grant.

The British stepfather of a six-year-old girl kidnapped in the Philippines has dismissed claims that the snatch was organised by her mother.