Chiz puzzled why MILF took seven hours to enforce ceasefire

 Entertainment
Feb 112015
 
Chiz puzzled why MILF took seven hours to enforce ceasefire

Interior Secretary Mar Roxas speaks with Defense Secretary Voltaire Gazmin during the Senate hearing on the Mamasapano incident. (MNS photo) Senator Chiz Escudero said he was puzzled why it took the Moro National Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) about six to seven hours to order its combatants to stop firing at the elite police force despite having knowledge that these were government troopers. Escudero raised this observation at the Senate hearing conducted earlier today by the Committee on Public Order and Dangerous Drugs with the Committees on Peace, Unification and Reconciliation, and the Committee on Finance, to shed light on the circumstances surrounding the January 25 Mamasapano clash that killed 44 members of the Philippine National Police-Special Action Force (PNP-SAF) and injured about over dozen others. During the Senate investigation, Rashid Ladiasan, head secretariat of the MILF’s Committee on the Cessation of Hostilities (CCCH), said that they received the information about the clashes between 6 a.m. and 6:30 a.m.. Reports, however, showed that MILF fighters stopped firing past noon that day. At this point, Escudero asked: “Why did it take six to seven hours before the MILF instructed their men to stop firing? They only stopped when everyone was dead.” “We have an ongoing peace talks, and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front already knew that the troops they were firing at were from the government. Why didn’t they stop firing?” Escudero pointed out. According to Ladiasan, lack of coordination and communication constrained the MILF from immediately carrying out a ceasefire. The senator also asked Read More …

AFP aids Muslim group despite bloody clash

 Entertainment
Feb 112015
 
AFP aids Muslim group despite bloody clash

Mourners take part in a memorial for the victims of the Mamasapano encounter in front of the Philippine National Police Headquarters in Quezon City Tuesday. The groups demand truth and accountability from those involved in the bloody clash, which resulted in the death of 44 PNP-SAF officers, 18 Moro rebels, and 7 civilians. (MNS photo) Manila, Philippines | AFP |  – Philippine soldiers rescued members of a Muslim armed group from rival extremists despite frayed ties over the killing of 44 policemen last month, a military report said Sunday. Members of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), which is engaged in a peace process with the government, were besieged by the rival Abu Sayyaf group in the troubled island of Basilan on Saturday, requiring military intervention, said a statement from the regional military command. “Three platoons… along with armoured vehicles together with some members of MILF in the area… proceeded to the encounter site to reinforce the beleaguered MILF members who were engaged in the firefight,” the statement said. One wounded MILF fighter was evacuated by the soldiers who later overran an Abu Sayyaf camp and are believed to have killed one Abu Sayyaf leader, the report added. MILF members and other Muslim fighters ambushed and killed 44 police commandos while they were on an anti-terror operation in the southern island of Mindanao on January 25. The incident violated a ceasefire between the government and the MILF and threatened President Benigno Aquino’s efforts to complete a peace process which would create Read More …

Valentine’s Day cuteness at Daiso

 Entertainment
Feb 102015
 
Valentine’s Day cuteness at Daiso

MANILA, Philippines – Celebrate the season of love with a touch of cuteness at Daiso Japan. For Valentine gifts, the store offers heart cookie cutters, assorted heart boxes, heart sandwich boxes, candy safety pins, heart-shaped microwave oven egg trays, silicone chocolate molds, flower magnets, and glittering clear rollers. You’ve probably seen these stores selling all kinds of merchandise for as low as P88. While these stores somehow look the same from the outside, not all are genuine hyakuen, or what is known in Japan as 100-yen stores. Certainly, customers looking for the best value for their money know better and shop at Daiso Japan, operated by Robinsons Retail Holdings, Inc., which holds the exclusive sub-license to sell authentic Daiso merchandise from Japan and operates the legitimate Daiso Japan store concept in the Philippines. Quality, variety, and uniqueness of products make Daiso Japan the No. 1 supplier of living ware goods all over Japan. Shelves upon shelves are replenished each week with the latest kawaii (cute) items from Japan, including licensed Sanrio and Disney items, so that customers are always assured of quality, along with big savings. Aside from variety, product aspects such as design, packaging, and functionality are important considerations, making Daiso Japan a favorite haunt for all things cute and practical by discerning shoppers. Because the store carries practically everything under one roof, picking out a gift for any occasion is a lot of fun. Lifestyle Feature ( Article MRec ), pagematch: 1, sectionmatch: After Valentine’s Day, get into Read More …

Love blooms

 Entertainment
Feb 102015
 
Love blooms

Robinsons Department Store style muse Maricar Reyes wears Stella. MANILA, Philippines – Stella, a fashion label of Robinsons Department Store, presents bolder colors and prints, easy mixing and matching, and versatile pieces that seamlessly go from day to night. Start the season of romance in carefree, sleeved dresses with A-line silhouettes emblazoned with floral prints. Seen with the year’s hottest colors of crimson and tangerine in easy, breezy cuts, these dresses go with the rosy season of love. For cocktail dressing, opt for the electrifying shade of blue. Best worn with a scallop neckline, a tapered waist, and just the right hint of sophisticated color-blocking, blue becomes the coolest hue for those sizzling nights. Garbed in these season’s finest threads from Stella  is Robinsons Department Store’s style muse Maricar Reyes.  Just as the brand breaks the boundaries of fast fashion and short-lived styles, Stella offers plenty of lasting practical, style-savvy pieces.

Pitito, Peru's oldest clown, keeps joking at 91

 Entertainment
Feb 102015
 
Pitito, Peru's oldest clown, keeps joking at 91

In this Feb. 7, 2015 photo, veteran clown Ricardo Farfan, popularly known as “Pitito,” poses for a portrait after performing at his 91st birthday party in his home in Lima, Peru. Farfan began painting his face to perform as a clown when he was three-years-old, alongside his father who owned the traveling Farfan Brothers Circus. “Chiminea” was his father’s clown name. (AP Photo/Esteban Felix) LIMA, Peru — Ricardo Farfan doesn’t get the jobs he used to. Sometimes his only audience is his wife. But every morning the 91-year-old clown still sips his coffee and studies an old notebook where he keeps hundreds of pages of jokes and comedy moves he has built up over almost nine decades in the circus. “I look at a page and repeat all the jokes by memory,” Farfan, known as Pitito the clown, said in his small home in a poor Lima neighborhood. In a closet he keeps his wigs, brightly colored socks and jackets, and enormous shoes. At age 3, Farfan began to paint his face together with his father, Chimenea the clown, who owned a 600-chair circus that traveled up and down Peru’s Pacific coast, over the country’s towering Andes mountains and across its vast Amazon jungle. “In my father’s circus I was a clown, magician, tightrope walker, trapeze artist, stilt-walker, electrician and painter,” he said. He sometimes worked in foreign circuses that visited Peru for its national holidays in July. The extra money helped Farfan mend and paint the big top for Read More …

Conquering New York with love and flowers

 Entertainment
Feb 092015
 
Conquering New York with love and flowers

NEW YORK – “If I can make it there, I’ll make it anywhere…,” goes the song originally sung by Frank Sinatra that has since been sung by many, even in karaoke bars worldwide. But while others can only sing it, Filipino entrepreneur Dennis Josue is living it. “I am most proud of the fact that I am not only living here in New York; but also thriving,” he said in a recent interview at Fantasia Floral Design, a flower shop he owns and runs in the East Village. The city is often referred to as the “concrete jungle” – busy, bustling with activity, intimidating and known for harsh winters and the perceived I-don’t-care attitude of the people. But florist Josue, who migrated from the Philippines in 1983, cares; and with this Filipino trait of caring, is able to conquer the urban complex with love and flowers. “I love flowers! I love looking at them, working with them. They never complain or talk back to you,” he joked. “They’re very pleasant to see. Seeing them makes me happy.” In the Philippines Josue graduated from San Beda College with a degree in Economics. But eager to pursue his passion for the performing arts, he also took classes at the University of the Philippines School of Dance, with a minor in voice training. After graduation, encouraged by his sister who was already living in New York, Josue packed his bags and the dream to perform in one of the greatest cities on the Read More …

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