Asiana Airlines to continue PH flights

 News
Jul 072013
 
Asiana Airlines to continue PH flights

By Miguel R. CamusPhilippine Daily Inquirer 2:57 am | Monday, July 8th, 2013 Fire crews respond to the scene where Asiana Flight 214 crashed at San Francisco International Airport on Saturday, July 6, 2013. Asiana Airlines may continue flying into the Philippines while the country’s air safety officials are waiting for the results of the investigation of the crash of one of the carrier’s planes in San Francisco, California, on Saturday. AP PHOTO/NOAH BERGER MANILA, Philippines—Asiana Airlines may continue flying into the Philippines while the country’s air safety officials are waiting for the results of the investigation of the crash of one of the carrier’s planes in San Francisco, California, on Saturday. The South Korean airline operates flights to Manila, Clark and Cebu. Deputy Director General John Andrews of the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP) said that if a problem with Asiana’s Boeing 777 was found to be the cause of the crash, it would have negative implications for the plane’s manufacturer and the airlines operating that type of aircraft. “Only two areas to be looked at: man and machine. It should not be difficult as the CVR (cockpit voice recorder) and FDR (flight data recorder) have been retrieved,” Andrews said. “If machine is the cause, there is possibility of worldwide grounding of Boeing 777,” he said. Philippine Airlines, which flies daily flights to San Francisco, said none of its flights would be diverted, as San Francisco International Airport has several runways. In a statement posted on its Read More …

PH elementary schools win 16 medals in Bulgaria math fest

 News
Jul 072013
 
PH elementary schools win 16 medals in Bulgaria math fest

By Jerry E. EsplanadaPhilippine Daily Inquirer 5:21 pm | Sunday, July 7th, 2013 MANILA, Philippines — With a 16-medal haul, the Philippine elementary mathematics team topped the primary division in the just-ended 2013 Bulgaria International Math Competition (BIMC), held June 30 to July 4 in the Black Sea city of Burgas. The good news was relayed to the Philippine Daily Inquirer on Sunday by Dr. Simon Chua, president of the non-government Mathematics Trainers’ Guild of the Philippines (MTG) and head of the Philippine delegation to the 29-country contest. The young Filipino math wizards, mostly students from Metro Manila private schools, bagged three gold, four silver, four bronze and five merit medals in the annual competition. The teams from Vietnam and Thailand placed second and third overall. In an e-mail, Chua also said that the Philippine high school team bagged a total of 14 medals, but failed to land in the Top 3, where the teams from Japan, Hong Kong and China emerged as champions. The Filipino medalists in the elementary level were: (Gold) Jinger Chong from St. Jude Catholic School; Shaquille Wyan Que from Grace Christian College; and Vicente Raphael Chan from Zamboanga Chong Hua High School. (Silver) Stefan Marcus Ang from St. Jude Catholic School, Steven John Wang from UNO High School, Jose Ignacio Locsin from St. John Institute in Bacolod City, and Tiffany Mae Ong from Immaculate Conception Academy; (Bronze) Luke Matthew Bernardo from Philadelphia High School, Adam Christopher Chan from Grace Christian College, Ryan Mark Shao from Read More …

PH sets conditions for continued Golan Heights deployment

 News
Jul 062013
 
PH sets conditions for continued Golan Heights deployment

By Tarra QuismundoPhilippine Daily Inquirer 3:47 pm | Saturday, July 6th, 2013 Foreign Secretary Albert del Rosario. AP FILE PHOTO MANILA, Philippines—President Benigno Aquino is willing to extend the deployment of Filipino peacekeepers in the conflict-stricken Golan Heights if the United Nations agrees to certain conditions regarding the safety of the Filipino soldiers, Foreign Secretary Albert del Rosario said Saturday. Del Rosario said the President was open to maintaining the country’s troops in the volatile ceasefire zone between Syria and Israel beyond the scheduled troop rotation on August 11 if safety and security conditions improve. At least 340 Filipino peacekeepers are detailed to the United Nations Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF) at the ceasefire zone, which has been wracked by a spillover of violence between Syrian government and rebel forces. “We are submitting our conditionalities [to the United Nations] for enhancing safety and security of Philippine peacekeepers in UNDOF,” Del Rosario told the Inquirer. “If these are approved, and the risk exposure does not exceed tolerable limits, the President has agreed for our people to remain beyond August 11 with a reassessment thereafter to be made every six months.” Del Rosario earlier proposed to Aquino the withdrawal of the Philippine contingent, currently UNDOF’s biggest, following  two separate abductions of Filipino “Blue Helmets”—21 in March and four in May— and the wounding of one during heavy fighting among Syrians in June. The Philippines sent an assessment team to the Golan last month to determine if safety and security conditions in the area Read More …

PH hunting down drug syndicates after China drug mule execution

 News
Jul 042013
 
PH hunting down drug syndicates after China drug mule execution

By Maila AgerINQUIRER.net 2:44 pm | Thursday, July 4th, 2013 MANILA, Philippines – Law enforcers are hunting down drug syndicates involved in recruiting couriers in the country, Vice President Jejomar Binay said on Thursday in the aftermath of the execution Wednesday of a Filipina drug mule in China. National Bureau of Investigation Reaction and Arrest and Interdiction Division Lawyer Ross Jonathan Galicia presents to the reporters 60 improvised capsule containing shabu, which are about the size of a thumb at the NBI Headquarters, Manila. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO “Tinatrabaho ‘yan ngayon ng PDEA at NBI. ‘Yung doon sa tatlo, nahuli na nila ‘yung recruiter (PDEA and NBI are now working on it. They already arrested the  recruiter  of the three),” Binay said in a statement. PDEA is Philippine  Drug  Enforcement  Agency while NBI is National Bureau of Investigation. Binay was referring to Mapet Cortez alias Tita Cacayan, who allegedly recruited Sarah Ordinario-Villanueva, one of the three overseas Filipino workers executed in China last year for drug smuggling. Cortez allegedly misled Ordinario-Villanueva into taking what she thought was an empty suitcase that turned out to be secretly lined with more than four kilos of heroin. Binay said the Philippine government is “doing all it could to stop Filipinos from engaging in the illegal drug trade.” Drug couriers, however, usually get the drugs outside the country, he pointed out. “Ang ruta nila usually via Dubai tapos Hong Kong tapos doon na sa may area ng Shanghai (Their  route  usually is via Dubai  to   Read More …

Palace: Increased US presence in PH still under study

 Entertainment
Jul 022013
 

MANILA (Mabuhay) — Malacañang on Friday said any proposal that would give US troops access to Philippine military bases would be made within the confines of the Constitution. “Allow us to stress that any proposal that will come out of it will certainly be done in accordance with the Constitution and the Visiting Forces Agreement,” […]

PH urges closer US-Asean ties to protect sea lanes

 News
Jul 022013
 
PH urges closer US-Asean ties to protect sea lanes

By Tarra QuismundoPhilippine Daily Inquirer 4:13 am | Wednesday, July 3rd, 2013 Foreign Secretary Albert del Rosario: Greater engagement between Asean and US, AP FILE PHOTO MANILA, Philippines—Unfazed by China’s accusation that the Philippines was “internationalizing” territorial disputes, Foreign Secretary Albert del Rosario has called for greater engagement between the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) and the United States in ensuring maritime security in the region. Speaking at the Asean-US Post-Ministerial Conference in Brunei Darussalam on Monday, Del Rosario also called for compliance to the 2002 Declaration on the Conduct (DOC) of Parties in the South China Sea (West Philippine Sea) as Asean and China were still working on a legally binding Code of Conduct (COC) to govern the disputed waters. The DOC is an agreement between the Asean and China that seeks to deter armed confrontations in the strategic waterway, a critical international trading route where China, the Philippines, Vietnam, Brunei, Malaysia and Taiwan have competing territorial claims. “Fortunately, we have an appropriate mechanism for dialogue and interaction on these matters—the Expanded Asean Maritime Forum —which was inaugurated in Manila in October 2012,” Del Rosario said in his speech, a copy of which was released in Manila by the Department of Foreign Affairs. His remarks followed China’s threat of a “counterstrike” in the disputed waters and pointed criticism of the Philippines’ stance on the regional maritime dispute, particularly blasting its involvement of dialogue partners, including the United States, in discussions toward resolving the dispute. Illegal occupation China also Read More …

Aquino defends use of bases by US, Japan

 News
Jul 022013
 
Aquino defends use of bases by US, Japan

‘Our strategic partners need knowledge of PH terrain’ By Michael Lim UbacPhilippine Daily Inquirer 12:05 am | Wednesday, July 3rd, 2013 President Aquino said for the first time on Tuesday that the United States and Japan would have access to the former US bases in the Philippines to be able to forge a “credible alliance” but dismissed Chinese claims that Manila was provoking Beijing. In an ambush interview in Camp Crame, Aquino stressed that giving the two countries access to the installations was “not permanent.” The United States had maintained Clark Air Base and Subic Bay Naval Base—America’s largest overseas military facilities—until Mt. Pinatubo erupted in June 1991 and forced the shutdown of the installations. Three months later, the Senate voted 12-11 against renewing the Philippines-US Military Bases Agreement. In 1999, the Philippines ratified the Visiting Forces Agreement allowing the United States to conduct joint exercises with Philippine forces in the country. “Let’s clarify the access. They will not be a permanent fixture in the bases—but they are our allies. There are only two strategic partners that we have—it is America and Japan,” he said, explaining that “interoperability” was key to prepare forces allied with each other for any conflict. This explains why the country has regular Balikatan exercises, which calls for “joint or shoulder-to-shoulder” military exercises, he said. He stressed that failure to “coordinate” or “synchronize” the military deployment systems between forces of allied countries in case of a conflict “in my view is a wrong way to prepare, Read More …

PH in the dark on exact date, time of Filipina’s execution in China

 News
Jul 022013
 
PH in the dark on exact date, time of Filipina’s execution in China

By Tarra QuismundoPhilippine Daily Inquirer 9:18 pm | Tuesday, July 2nd, 2013 DFA spokesperson Raul Hernandez INQUIRER.net FILE PHOTO MANILA, Philippines — The deadline is Wednesday (July 3), but the Philippines remains in the dark on the exact time the Filipino drug courier sentenced to death in China will be executed. The Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) said on Tuesday afternoon that the Chinese government had not informed the Philippine government when it would carry out the death penalty on the 35-year-old Filipino woman arrested for drug trafficking in the city of Hangzhou in eastern China in 2011. “We have not yet received any specific date or time for the execution of our kababayan in Hangzhou, but it seems that it is very imminent,” the DFA spokesperson, Assistant Secretary Raul Hernandez, said in a press briefing on Tuesday. On Monday, the woman’s family, including her mother and son, were granted a 30-minute final visit at the Zhejiang Detention Center in Hangzhou, where she has been jailed for two years now. The family, who was in Shanghai as of Tuesday, has requested that their privacy be respected and asked that their loved one’s name be kept in confidence, Hernandez said. “We don’t know if we will be informed before or after [the execution]. There were cases when we were informed before and there were cases when it happened right after the visit of the family of the accused,” he said. Hernandez said the execution would likely be carried out through lethal Read More …

PH, US end naval exercises near disputed sea

 News
Jul 022013
 
PH, US end naval exercises near disputed sea

By Frances MangosingINQUIRER.net 7:25 pm | Tuesday, July 2nd, 2013 USS Fitzgerald (C). INQUIRER FILE PHOTO MANILA, Philippines – The Philippine-US joint military exercise, Cooperation Afloat Readiness and Training, concluded on Tuesday after six days of a series of shore-based and at sea events. The ceremony was held on board the guided-missile destroyer USS Fitzgerald (DDG 62), the United States Embassy said in a statement. Shore-based training events covered several naval competencies, including jungle warfare and marksmanship; tactical combat casualty care; riverine small boat operations; visit, board, search and seizure; and diving and salvage. In the exercises 60 nautical miles east of Panatag, an area claimed both by China and Philippines, the Fitzgerald conducted maneuvering, communications and gunnery exercises with the Philippine Navy flagship BRP Gregorio del Pilar (PF 15) and the Philippine coast guard salvage and rescue vessel BRP Edsa (SARV 02). Panatag Shoal, an area contested by Philippines and China, is located 124 nautical miles off Zambales, but is well within the country’s 200-nautical mile exclusive economic zone. The dispute led to a maritime standoff between the Philippines and China last year. The incident prompted Manila to seek the United Nations’ arbitration. Participating ships included the guided missile destroyer USS Fitzgerald (DDG 62) with embarked Commander, Task Group 73.1/ Destroyer Squadron (DESRON) 7 staff, and the diving and salvage ships, USNS Safeguard (T-ARS 50) and USNS Salvor (T-ARS 52). A company of Marines from India Company, 3rd Battalion, 3rd Marine Regiment participated in the shore-based events. “It was a Read More …

Palace defends access plan

 News
Jun 282013
 
Palace defends access plan

US troops’ use of PH bases to be temporary By TJ Burgonio, Nikko Dizon and Norman BordadoraPhilippine Daily Inquirer 12:51 am | Saturday, June 29th, 2013 Malacañang on Friday defended a plan to give the United States, Japan and other allies access to military bases in the Philippines, saying the country was free to do anything within its territory. But the plan, which coincides with the United States’ “pivot” to Asia, a strategy that would see 60 percent of America’s warships shifting to the region by the end of the decade, has yet to be approved by President Benigno Aquino III, deputy presidential spokesperson Abigail Valte said. Several senators acknowledged that the Philippines needs the assistance the United States and other allies can bring by their presence in the country, but they said the proposed access agreements under the plan would need Senate approval. The Senate voted to expel US military bases from the Philippines in 1991, but ratified the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA) in 1999 to allow US forces access to the country through joint exercises with Philippine forces. No longer visiting Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile, one of the 12 senators who voted to expel the US military bases, said the VFA allowed only a temporary stay of US forces in the country. “They cannot establish any military base in the Philippines,” Enrile said. “Temporary or whatever term they use, no military bases. If it assumes a certain degree of permanence or stability, then it’s no longer visiting forces,” Read More …

 Older Entries  Newer Entries