PHL, Malaysia, Indonesia to boost fight vs terrorism, extremism

From the Philippine News Agency (Jun 16): PHL, Malaysia, Indonesia to boost fight vs terrorism, extremism

Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) Secretary Alan Peter Cayetano on Friday said he will meet foreign ministers and security officials of Malaysia and Indonesia here next week to discuss enhancing cooperation in fighting against terrorism and extremism.

“We will be talking about enhanced cooperation so how we can deal with it tripartite with Indonesia and Malaysia. And how ASEAN can play a more major role in preventing the spill over from Iraq and Syria,” he told reporters.

Cayetano did not give the specific date of the meeting, noting this is still being arranged.

“But the aim is to make it a group effort, an inter-country effort, team effort, rather than each country fending off extremism by themselves,” he said.

The DFA official added that Indonesian Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi proposed holding the meeting and Malaysian Foreign Minister Anifah Aman immediately agreed to the idea.

The meeting of the three countries comes at a time of intensified fighting between Philippine government forces and terrorists in Marawi City. The siege of Marawi started May 23.

http://www.pna.gov.ph/articles/995961