What we do and don't know about the Bondi gunmen's month in the Philippines

Bomb squad sweeps, police combing through CCTV footage and a city in a state of concern.

You'd be forgiven for thinking this is a description of what's taking place in Sydney following the deadliest alleged terror attack in Australian history.

But it's not. The long shadow of the Bondi shooting that killed 15 people has also darkened the coastal southern Philippines, causing deep confusion and stoking long-held anxieties over terrorist groups in the region.

Shortly after the shooting, it was revealed that Sajid Akram, 50, and his son Naveed Akram, went to Davao on the island of Mindanao for almost a month.

They left the Philippines just over two weeks before the shooting at a Hanukkah event in Bondi, killing 15 people.

A flurry of police and military activity is now taking place in Davao, more than 5,000 kilometres away from the site of the shooting.

It is a region that has long struggled with Islamic extremism, with several groups pledging allegiance to Islamic State in 2014.

Earlier last week, a senior counterterrorism official told the ABC they were investigating whether the pair allegedly underwent training while in the Philippines.

Some analysts speculated that the pair could have met with militants while in the city of Davao.

As police from both countries continue to investigate what the pair did in Mindanao, here's what we do and don't know.

Room 315

The Philippines Bureau of Immigration has confirmed that Sajid and Naveed Akram arrived in the country on November 1 and left on November 28.

According to officials, they had never been to the country before.

An immigration spokesperson confirmed photos of the pair that were taken at Manila's Ninoy Aquino International Airport on November 1.

Staff at a budget accommodation in Davao, GV Hotel, told the ABC that the pair then stayed there for four weeks.

The ABC has seen hotel computer logs that show the check-in and check-out times, along with weekly payments of cash for the room.

The room costs $24, or 930 pesos, per night.

According to hotel staff, they stayed in room 315, a small, basic room with two single beds.

They also arrived with a large bag and didn't provide ID or a passport.

Staff said the men generally stayed holed up in their room, leaving to go out for about an hour or so once a day, and departing on foot.

A staff member described the pair as not suspicious, but as unapproachable, and not talkative with hotel staff.

Staff said nothing out of the ordinary was found in the room after they left.

The CCTV sighting

Staff at GV Hotel said their CCTV was on a weekly loop, so any video of the two men would have already been overwritten.

CCTV footage obtained by the ABC from a store nearby shows a man who the hotel staff then identified as Naveed Akram.

The man appears to be walking in a direction away from the hotel at about 5am, looking at his phone, before he goes out of frame.

When asked if it was normal for Naveed Akram to leave the hotel at this time, staff were unsure.

They said their front desk was casually monitored by a worker on the graveyard shift.

The day the ABC published the CCTV images, Philippine police were going into stores near the hotel to copy their footage.

Out of concern over an investigation by authorities, store owners in the area who had CCTV footage from November were unwilling to provide it to the ABC.

In a recorded statement issued on Sunday, Police Brigadier General Victor Rosete said multiple agencies were still investigating Sajid and Naveed Akram's month-long stay.

"[We] have immediately conducted backtracking operations to establish their movements during their stay," he said.

"This included a review of CCTV, hotel records, travel data and other available information.

"We are also examining any activities they may have conducted during their stay."

He said they were also identifying individuals the two men interacted with, and identifying possible links and support networks.

Police will also reportedly investigate why the pair paid for one week at the hotel, then extended their stay weekly for a month.

A police spokesperson said they were also investigating a visit Sajid Akram allegedly made to a firearms store in Davao. 

Why Mindanao?

This last week has firmly put Davao — a city that has received its fair share of attention — back in the public spotlight.

The city's mayor is former president Rodrigo Duterte, who is currently before the International Criminal Court, accused of crimes against humanity.

The region of Mindanao, which encompasses Davao, has long struggled with Islamic extremism.

Several groups, like Abu Sayyaf and Islamic State East Asia, have pledged allegiance to Islamic State.

Militants captured the city of Marawi in 2017, with the Armed Forces of the Philippines recapturing it five months later after a bloody conflict.

Since then, the military has been working to defeat the remnants of cells, but acknowledges that some fighters do remain in the provinces of Maguindinao del Sur and Lanao del Sur.

These groups have had access to training camps, but many analysts believe the remaining militants do not have the capacity to conduct extensive training of fighters.

Political analyst Edmund Tayao said the size of the remaining IS-aligned groups meant that members could perhaps have travelled to Davao.

"Very small groups means that they can easily move from one area to another," Mr Tayao said.

"It's not impossible for the Bondi attackers to have met with any of the ISIS groups.

"We need to find out whether they have met with any of these groups and what was the reason."

In a statement this week, Philippines national security adviser Eduardo Ano said there had been "no recorded terrorist training activities or significant operations by these ISIS-affiliated groups since 2017".

The mood in the city

Earlier in the week, shortly after the news broke that the pair had been in Davao, local media outlets were bursting with questions about the safety of their city.

A press conference with regional and city police was dominated by questions about security, knowing that just weeks before the Bondi attack, the pair were in Davao.

Just under a decade ago, Davao was rocked by the bombing of a night market, killing 15 people.

Several members of an Islamic State-aligned group were prosecuted.

Davao police were on the front foot on Wednesday, reassuring the public that the city was safe, especially ahead of Christmas.

But on that day, Davao police didn't want to publicly confirm that Sajid and Naveed Akram had been to the city, stating that they were still investigating.

Investigators are still piecing together a timeline of the Akrams' mysterious trip to the Philippines, as they try to understand why they came to the coastal Philippines just before carrying out the attack.