MANILA, Philippines (AP) — Philippine officials said Sunday that they would not release two leaders of a violent rebel group fighting to overthrow the government, whose arrests were a serious blow to one of Asia’s longest-running communist insurgencies.

Communist rebels have demanded the release of Benito Tiamzon, chairman of the Communist Party of the Philippines, and his wife, Wilma Austria, who were captured in central Cebu province with five other suspected Maoist insurgents on Saturday.