President Rodrigo Duterte said Monday that United States military forces have to leave Mindanao to prevent being targeted by kidnap-for-ransom
groups, particularly the Abu Sayyaf.
”I do not want a rift with America , but they have to go. The
Americans, they (bandits) will really kill them. They will get ransom and they
will kill (hostages),” President Duterte said in his speech during the
oath-taking of his 43 new appointees in Malacañang.
”So those (US )
special forces, they have to go. There are many white there. They have to go,”
he added.
President Duterte said he was supposed to raise the issue
when he attended the recently concluded ASEAN Summit in Laos .
”But I did not speak about it out of respect,” Duterte, the
country’s first president from Mindanao , said.
Recently, the Philippine government increased its military
presence to almost 10,000 troops in Sulu to crush the Abu Sayyaf.
Meanwhile, Presidential Spokesperson Ernesto Abella released
a media statement to clarify President Duterte’s call for the US forces to leave Mindanao .
”The statement reflects PRRD's (President Duterte's) new
direction towards coursing an independent foreign policy. He has made reference
to the unrecognized, unrepented and un-atoned for massacre at Bud Dajo in Sulu
by the Americans, hence our continued connection with West is the real reason
for the 'Islamic' threat in Mindanao ,” Abella
said.
”The American silence on the matter lacks congruence with
its 'moral' position, in the light of actions taken in the past by the Germans
who confessed and made atonement for the Holocaust, and Japan which made
reparations for the atrocities it perpetrated among the peoples they conquered.
Mr. Duterte is on morally firm ground by breaking up walls that cover dark
corners in US-RP relations,” he added.
http://www.pna.gov.ph/index.php?idn=1&sid=&nid=1&rid=922377
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