Kerry: US, Phl can work through confusion

WASHINGTON/MANILA – US Secretary of State John Kerry is confident after speaking to his Philippine counterpart that the two countries can “work through” a period of confusion caused by antiAmerican rhetoric from President Duterte, the State Department said on Monday.

State Department spokesman John Kirby said Kerry expressed concern in his conversation on Sunday with Foreign Secretary Perfecto Yasay Jr. about the tone of remarks by the Philippine president,

who has sharply criticized President Barack Obama and talked of separation from Washington.

At the same time, Kerry emphasized strong and stable ties between the longtime allies, while Kirby said Washington had seen no practical action by Manila to move away from those.

Kerry’s conversation with Yasay came after Duterte provoked alarm last week by announcing a “separation” from the United States and realignment with China during a visit to Beijing.

Although Duterte said later he did not really mean separation, his remarks added to concerns about the future of a US-Philippine military cooperation pact seen as crucial to projecting US power in Asia in the face of fast-rising China.

Earlier on Monday, the most senior US diplomat for Asia, Assistant Secretary of State for East Asia Daniel Russel, said in Manila that Washington remained a “trusted” ally to the Philippines and supported its blossoming ties with China.

Russel was the first highlevel visitor from Washington since Duterte’s remarks and Kirby said that both Russel and Kerry made clear the United States had every intention of continuing to meet its security commitments to the Philippines.

“The tone and tenor of the discussions that they had... and the assurances that the Philippine side gave to their commitment to keeping the relationship going was enough to lead the secretary and the assistant secretary to believe that we were going to be able to work through this,” Kirby told a regular news briefing.

‘Real climate of uncertainty’

In his comments to reporters, Russel said he had candidly told Yasay that Manila’s friends were concerned about the high loss of life in Duterte’s campaign against drugs and reiterated the importance of due process.

Russel said “a real climate of uncertainty about the Philippines’ intentions had created consternation in many countries,” including the United States. He said that worry extended beyond governments to corporate boardrooms and warned that it was “bad for business” in “a very competitive region.”

Since Duterte took office on June 30, he has been scathing about US criticism of his antidrug campaign, in which over 3,000 people have been killed. But his ministers have repeatedly sought to soften his more outspoken remarks.

Explaining Duterte’s “Goodbye America” remarks, Yasay said on Saturday the United States remained the “closest friend” of the Philippines but that Manila wanted to break away from a “mindset of dependency and subservience” and forge closer ties with other nations.

Russel said Duterte himself had “already walked back” his remarks and added that Washington supported direct dialogue and negotiations between the Philippines and China. “We don’t want countries to have to choose between the US and China,” he said.

US wants to stay in south Phl – envoy

The United States wants to remain involved in the campaign to quell Islamic militancy in the southern Philippines, its ambassador to Manila said yesterday after President Duterte threatened to kick out American forces.

Ambassador Philip Goldberg said the security threat in the conflict-plagued region was “very serious,” warning the Islamic State group was among a number of foreign militant organizations trying to increase its involvement there.

“We’ve helped the Philippines as it has reduced the threat over time,” Goldberg told ABS-CBN television.

“But we are concerned obviously about any new intrusion of ISIS (Islamic State group) or any other group that wants to take advantage of open space in the south of the Philippines. So we want to continue doing that.”

The United States had deployed from 2002 to 2014 a rotating force of about 600 troops to the southern Philippines to train local soldiers in how to combat Islamic militants.

The presence was scaled down after the United States deemed the militants there had “largely devolved into disorganized groups resorting to criminal undertakings,” according to a US statement in 2014.

Islamic militant attacks spiked after that, most prominently with the homegrown Abu Sayyaf group abducting dozens of foreigners and locals to extort ransoms.

About 100 American troops remain in the south, Goldberg said on Tuesday.

But Duterte, who took office on June 30, has said they are adding to tensions with the Islamic communities in the southern region of Mindanao.

“These US special forces, they have to go in Mindanao,” Duterte said last month.

Duterte, who describes himself as a socialist and part Muslim, has called for their ejection as part of a general effort to dilute his nation’s 70-year alliance with the United States.

Islamic militants have waged a decades-long separatist insurgency in Mindanao that has claimed more than 120,000 lives.

The region is the ancestral homeland of the Muslim minority in the mainly Catholic Philippines.

The major rebel organizations are no longer waging armed struggle, but harder-line splinter groups such as the Abu Sayyaf have remained a threat.

Goldberg warned Jemaah Islamiyah, a Southeast Asian group responsible for the deadly 2002 bombings on the Indonesian resort island of Bali, and other foreigners were in Mindanao.

“This is a very serious issue,” Goldberg said.

“We are not just dealing with Abu Sayyaf but groups from the region like Jemaah Islamiyah. We see increasing efforts from ISIS to become involved.”

Goldberg said yesterday that while Philippine-US relations remain strong, “the question is how do we build the house together and whether we are going to continue building.”

Duterte’s statements combined with insults and profane language against the US have caused uncertainty in the century-old alliance.

Goldberg, however, said the fundamentals of the relationship are strong and solid, from people-to-people to business communities and even on the military aspect.

“What’s uncertain are the statements that we’ve been hearing and the lack of any real clarity about what they mean in terms of how we carry out those relations,” Goldberg said in an interview on ANC’s

“That means that on something like the Mutual Defense Treaty, the Visiting Forces Agreement, the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA) which are important for our military relationship… exactly what’s going to happen with those,” he said. “The statements that have been made call many of those things into question.”

Duterte’s statement in Beijing about the Philippines cutting military and economic ties with the US, Goldberg said, is “certainly the most serious of the different statements that have been made in potential policy terms.”

He said it was “unusual for a head of state to make that kind of statement in another country without discussing it with us.”

‘Solid foundation’