PRESIDENT Duterte is ready to offer the country’s facilities for use by the United States should the ongoing Russia-Ukraine conflict spills over to Asia, the country’s envoy to Washington said yesterday.
Ambassador Jose “Babe” Romualdez said he met with Duterte last week when he was in Manila.
“If push comes to shove, the Philippines will be ready to be part of the effort, especially if the crisis spills over to the Asian region,” Romualdez said in an online forum, adding that he already conveyed Duterte’s assurance to Washington.
“He (Duterte) says if they’re asking for the support of the Philippines, he was very clear that if push comes to shove the Philippines will be ready to be part of the effort especially if this Ukrainian crisis spills over to the Asian region,” he added.
Romualdez explained that part of Duterte’s reasoning is that Manila should honor its commitment under the Mutual Defense Treaty between the Philippines and the US if the need arises and the situation warrants it.
The MDT signed in 1951 commits both countries to come to each other’s aid in case of foreign aggression or armed attack on its troops, ships and aircraft.
The envoy said among the facilities that the country may offer for use by the US is Subic Bay and Clark in Pampanga.
Subic and Clark formerly hosted US naval and air force units until 1992 when the Senate said no to the renewal of the lease for the bases.
“He (Duterte) said that he is allowing the use of facilities, which I assume would be the use of Clark for instance, for some of the aircraft that the United States may need,” Romualdez said.
He said Clark may be opened for use in an “emergency” situation.
“Let’s pray that it doesn’t happen but if this spreads out into our part, the Asian region, for some reason or another, the President obviously sees the need for us to make a choice and our choices, since we have an MDT with the United States, we have this special relationship, our military alliance,” Romualdez further said.
Duterte has a volatile relationship with the US, especially after he pushed for closer relationship with Beijing and Moscow, two of Washington’s ideological rivals.
In a related development, Romualdez said Duterte was “half and half” about attending the planned meeting between US President Joe Biden and leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations in Washington if the date of the summit falls on his 77th birthday on March 28.
“He was not very keen about it especially because the end of March, March 28 is his birthday. So that is another reason why he says that he never really leaves his residence which is a tradition and something that’s always followed,” Romualdez said.
However, Cambodia which chairs the ASEAN bloc this year already said that the summit which was originally set for March 28 and 29 has been moved to a later date as some leaders of the 10-member bloc cannot attend on the proposed dates.
Romualdez said if the event is held at a later date “there is a possibility that he may go.”
Duterte, whose single six year term is set to end on June 30 this year, has never visited Washington during his presidency though he paid state visits to China and Russia.
The Department of Foreign Affairs said 90 Filipinos have been brought back to Manila since Russian troops invaded Ukraine on February 24.
Undersecretary for Migrant Workers Affairs Sarah Lou Arriola said 169 others were safely evacuated from Ukraine and were just waiting for their their repatriation flights to Manila.
She said 259 Filipinos in Ukraine were assisted by the DFA through its embassies in countries neighboring Ukraine such as Poland, Romania and Hungary.
At the start of the Ukraine-Russia conflict, the DFA said there are about 380 Filipinos in Ukraine and 8,000 in Russia.
ACCESS
Ukraine said on Thursday Moscow had refused to guarantee humanitarian access to rescue hundreds of thousands of civilians trapped under bombardment, as the opposing sides yielded nothing at the highest level talks since the Russian invasion began.
Russia’s war in Ukraine entered the third week with none of its stated objectives reached, despite thousands of people killed, more than two million made refugees and thousands cowering in besieged cities under relentless bombardment.
Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba met Russia’s Sergei Lavrov in Turkey, but said he had secured no promise from him to halt firing so aid could reach civilians, including Kyiv’s main humanitarian priority – evacuating hundreds of thousands of people trapped in the besieged port of Mariupol.
“I made a simple proposal to Minister Lavrov: I can call my Ukrainian ministers, authorities, president now and give you 100% assurances on security guarantees for humanitarian corridors,” he said.
“I asked him ‘can you do the same?’ and he did not respond.”
Holding his own simultaneous news conference in a separate room, Lavrov showed no sign of making any concessions, repeating Russian demands that Ukraine be disarmed and accept neutral status. He said Kyiv appeared to want meetings for the sake of meetings and that a ceasefire was not meant to be on the agenda at the Turkey talks.
Russia calls its actions a special military operation to disarm its neighbor and dislodge leaders it calls neo-Nazis. Kyiv and its Western allies say this is a baseless pretext to invade a country of 44 million people.
Aid agencies say humanitarian aid is most urgently needed in Mariupol, where 400,000 people have been trapped for more than a week with no food, water or power. The city council said the port had come under fresh air strikes on Thursday morning, a day after Moscow bombed what Ukraine called a functioning maternity hospital there.
Lavrov said the building was no longer used as a hospital and had been occupied by Ukrainian forces. The Kremlin did not initially repeat that denial and said the incident was being investigated.
“What kind of country is this, the Russian Federation, which is afraid of hospitals, is afraid of maternity hospitals, and destroys them?” President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said in a televized address late on Wednesday, after posting footage of the wreckage.
Ukraine said a convoy trying to reach the city had again been turned back by Russian fire on Thursday, and accused Moscow of deliberately blocking aid. Daily attempts at a local humanitarian ceasefire have failed since Saturday. — With Reuters
