MANILA, Philippines – Even from behind bars, the Muslim extremist group Abu Sayyaf gave the Philippines yet another crisis – a 29-hour prison uprising, live on national TV.

After negotiations failed, President Arroyo sent in police armed with guns and tear gas for an assault that killed 22 inmates, including three leaders of Abu Sayyaf, a group notorious for deadly attacks and ransom kidnappings in which hostages have been beheaded.

“The terrorists got what was coming to them,” Ms. Arroyo’s spokesman Ignacio Bunye said in a statement. “The crisis team gave them all the chances to peacefully surrender.”

In a country weary of terror attacks and jailbreaks, public opinion was likely to be similar. Bystanders applauded as sweat-soaked police marksmen filed out of the building after the assault.

But in the restive south, where insurgencies for Muslim self-rule have been raging for the last three decades, the prison assault was bound to be seen as heavy-handed, and security forces braced for possible attacks. The inmates had warned of bombings if there was an assault on the jail.

“We hope there’s going to be no retaliatory strikes from our Muslim brothers because they know what happened here,” national police chief Arturo Lomibao said after the standoff. “We tried to resolve it peacefully. There’s no such thing as persecution or that we are singling them out.”

Officials said police found eight handguns and two unexploded grenades inside the maximum-security prison, which holds about 425 terror suspects and others charged with major crimes.