Maniolas

Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana on Wednesday refuted President Rodrigo Duterte’s statement that US troops are high-value targets of terrorists in Mindanao. During the House of Representatives appropriations committee hearing the Department of National Defense’s (DND) proposed P178.2 billion budget in 2017, Lorenzana said US forces in Mindanao, where they help Filipino troops on intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance , were equipped enough to protect themselves from bandit groups. Duterte had called for the pull-out of American troops in Mindanao warning that they may be subjected to reprisal by the Moro given the island region’s history of American brutalities during the 1900’s pacification campaign. READ: Duterte: US forces must go “
Yung mga fears ni Presidente that they night be subjected to reprisal of the Muslims, hindi naman siguro mangyayari yun,” Lorenzana said. (The President’s fears that they might be subjected to reprisal of the Muslims, that seems improbable.) He added that US troops were only based in military camps, and when they go out to Manila or for vacations they are usually well-armed. “Nasa kampo lang sila (They just stay in the camps). They won’t go out of their camps mag-isa lang sila (They won’t leave their camps alone), or they’re also armed,” Lorenzana said. “Let’s remember, these people are also combatants. They are not civilians subject to kidnapping by terrorists,” he added. CDG Latest Duterte’s anti-US rhetoric, policy jitters spook investors UN hits Duterte for ‘lack of understanding’ of human rights bodies Poe: Traffic a ‘daily dose of indignity and torment’ More ads, better infra needed to boost Read More …

Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana told a House committee on Wednesday that the Philippines did not have the capability to enforce the rights of the country in disputed territories in the West Philippine Sea. Photos show the BRP Ramon Alcaraz (top), the most ‘modern’ ship in the Philippine Navy, and the Chinese guided missile destroyer Taizhou (bottom). INQUIRER FILE / AP FILE Lacking the capability to enforce the Philippines’s rights in the West Philippine Sea, Manila will maintain the status quo in territories also being claimed by other countries, Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana said Wednesday, September 14, 2016. Delfin made the disclosure before the House committee on appropriations during the hearing for the Department of National Defense’s proposed P178.2 billion budget for 2017. Following the previous administration’s falling out with China, President Duterte has called for bilateral talks with Beijing over the resource-rich waters. Duterte has been perceived as favoring China over long-time ally, the United States. “As per the pronouncement of the President, we will maintain status quo in the West Philippine Sea so that there would be no miscalculations,” Lorenzana said. “We don’t have any assets to confront the other claimants in the area,” he added. The Philippines won its maritime case against China over the West Philippine Sea, after the United Nations Arbitral Tribunal in the Hague ruled that Beijing’s nine-dash line claim to almost all of the South China Sea had no historic and legal basis. The tribunal said the West Philippine Sea was within the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone (EEZ). READ: Philippines wins arbitration case vs. China over South China Sea  Duterte expressed Read More …

An employee cleans a logo at the Genki Sushi conveyor belt restaurant chain Tuesday, Aug. 16, 2016, in Aiea, Hawaii. The Hawaii State Department of Health Sanitation said Tuesday that Genki Sushi was being ordered to close its 10 restaurants on Oahu and one on Kauai after state authorities identified its raw scallops as the probable source of a hepatitis A outbreak. The disease can cause fever, loss of appetite and other symptoms. AP The Philippine government has suspended distribution of seafood believed to be the cause of a hepatitis A outbreak in Hawaii. De Oro Resources Inc. must temporarily suspend distribution of its products, according to an order by the Philippines’ Department of Agriculture Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources. Hawaii’s Department of Health last month identified frozen scallops served raw at a sushi chain as the probable cause. The scallops are produced by De Oro Resources. READ: Cebu scallops blamed for hepa A in Hawaii Andres Bojos, director of the agriculture bureau in the Central Visayas region, said officials required the company to test workers, including those who shuck scallops and those who work in their plant. All of them tested negative for hepatitis A, he said. The Hawaii outbreak has sickened more than 250 people. Bojos said Tuesday that De Oro Resources remains suspended pending completion of the audit they are doing. Aside from scallops, De Oro also exports shrimp. “We required the operator to subject all their personnel involved in the supply chain from those who shuck Read More …