Government-armed former militiamen wanted for murder and banditry took more than 70 villagers and children hostage Thursday from a southern Philippines village, demanding charges be dropped against them before they would free the captives.

The abductions raised fresh questions over the government's long-standing policy of arming civilian volunteers to protect against insurgencies. Just the day before, 100 other militiamen in the south were accused of slaughtering civilians in the country's worst political massacre.

Hours after the kidnapping Thursday, the gunmen freed the 17 children they held after talking with a government negotiator.

They continued to hold 57 hostages, most of them women. Negotiations were to resume Friday morning outside three remote hilltop huts in the southern Philippine hinterland where the gunmen had holed up with their captives.

The 15 hostage-takers in San Martin hamlet in Agusan del Sur province are former militiamen who had been dismissed and turned to banditry and extortion, targeting mining and logging companies in the area, said police Chief Superintendent Jaime Milla.

For decades, the Philippines government has armed civilian volunteers _ often poorly trained and ill-disciplined _ as a backup security force in areas with communist or Muslim insurgencies.

Human rights groups have called on the Philippines to stop arming civilians, saying the region is already awash with weapons from the ongoing conflicts.

At least 100 government militiamen are among 161 suspects in last month's massacre of 57 people in an election convoy in Maguindanao province, on the opposite western side of volatile Mindanao Island.

The country's worst political killings prompted the government to send troops to disarm all paramilitary groups and declare martial law in the province. After the Nov. 23 killings, President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo created an independent commission to oversee the dismantling of clan-dominated private armies _ which usually consist of government militias.

Thursday's kidnappers had been pursued by police in a nearby village, where officers on Wednesday had failed to serve arrest warrants for two brothers among them, said Senior Superintendent Nestor Fajura, regional police operations officer.

Another attempt by police to arrest them Thursday sent the Perez brothers and the other gunmen fleeing and along the way randomly grabbing some 75 people at gunpoint, Fajura said.