School teachers, children held hostage on Philippine bus

MANILA (CNN) -- At least two gunmen took a group of more than 30 preschool children and their teachers hostage on a bus as they left on a field trip Wednesday morning in Manila, authorities said. The gunmen were demanding housing and education for kids at a daycare center. According to local media reports, one of the hostage-takers was the owner of the daycare center and a local politician identified him as Jun Ducat, a man who had taken two Catholic priests hostage over a pay dispute in the 1980s. "He actually knows all of these children and all of the teachers of the bus," said Social Welfare Secretary Esperanza Cabral, who talked with Ducat on the phone. "He has been a donor to the daycare center and to the school."