Regional terrorist group Jemaah Islamiyah is using the Philippines as a sanctuary and the country must confront the threat, Americaâs top spy said yesterday.
US Director of National Intelligence John Negroponte, who was in Manila as part of a visit to allies in East Asia, said the United States continues to see the Philippines as a "close partner" in the war on terror and is ready to provide assistance to improve the countryâs counterterrorism capability.
At a dinner Tuesday with President Arroyo at Malacañang, Negroponte prodded the Philippine government to pass an anti-terrorism law.
"Southern (Philippines) is a focal point of terrorist and security threats," Negroponte told The STAR yesterday. "International terrorists, especially Jemaah Islamiyah (JI), have... used Philippine territory as a sanctuary for some of their activities."
Security officials in the region have expressed concern that JI, loosely linked to al-Qaeda, continues to maintain terrorist training centers in areas protected by certain members of the separatist Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) in Central Mindanao.
Two Malaysians tagged as the brains behind the nightclub bombings that killed 202 people on the Indonesian island of Bali in 2002 are believed to have taken refuge in these sanctuaries in Mindanao. Washington has put up a combined bounty of $11 million for the capture of the two fugitives.
Singapore authorities reportedly warned Manila that JI militants had plotted to launch terror attacks during the just concluded 23rd Southeast Asian Games in the Philippines.
Negroponteâs arrival in Manila Tuesday afternoon coincided with the suspension of public services at the US Embassy in Manila in the wake of what Press Attaché Matthew Lussenhop described as a "plausible threat."
The services will resume today.
Lussenhop denied that the threat was connected to the visit of Negroponte - his first to the country where he served as ambassador from 1993 to 1996, and his first to Asia since becoming the first US director of national intelligence earlier this year.
As part of a "national intelligence strategy" released by Negroponteâs office last October, the US is strengthening foreign intelligence relationships and human intelligence capability.
Negroponte declined to go into specifics about US intelligence cooperation with the Philippines, but said Washington planned to increase human intelligence capabilities worldwide by as much as 50 percent over the next years.
"With the end of the Cold War, we allowed our human intelligence capabilities to decline somewhat and there was, if you will, a hollowing-out of our intelligence services," Negroponte told The STAR in an interview at the US Embassy residence in Forbes Park in Makati City. "In the wake of 9/11, the decision was made that we had to restore and increase those capabilities."
Asked if he thought the Philippines had the capability to contain the terrorist threat, he cited the arrest of the Valentineâs Day bombers and said, "I think this is a dynamic, ongoing process... youâve had some successes, and you have captured some significant terrorists."
"In a long-term struggle such as this, people have their ups and downs, they have their wins and their losses," he added. "I think by strengthening your own institutions, by passing your anti-terrorist legislation - I think thatâs one of the areas we think would be very important."
He said he discussed this with the President at the Malacañang dinner where National Security Adviser Norberto Gonzales was also present.
"I think that all the Filipino officials that I spoke to believe that itâs desirable to seek the passage of that legislation, and that it would be a helpful tool in confronting the terrorist threat that you see in this country," Negroponte said.
Forging peace with the MILF, he said, could help neutralize the support given by rogue separatist militants to JI and the Abu Sayyaf.
"That is one of the reasons it is considered important that the peace talks between the government of the Philippines and the MILF be successful and that the talks being brokered by the government of Malaysia bear fruit, because that would help deny JI sanctuary," Negroponte said.
US Embassy Chargé dâ Affaires Paul Jones agreed.
"We have seen the MILF come out publicly and in our observations, the leading elements of the MILF are now saying that the terrorists are not welcome in MILF territory. And that has been a very important factor, which could be consolidated with a peace agreement being signed," Jones said. "We are very encouraged by that."
Negroponte and embassy officials clarified that his arrival had been planned for some time and was not a surprise visit. He left yesterday for visits to South Korea and Japan.
Since assuming his post in April after serving as the United Statesâ first ambassador to post-war Iraq, Negroponte has visited the United Kingdom and parts of the Middle East. His ongoing Asian tour is just his third foreign trip as Americaâs top spy.
"I am visiting friendly allied countries, countries with which we have important security interests," Negroponte said yesterday.
He said his meetings with Mrs. Arroyo Tuesday and with Philippine national security and intelligence officials yesterday morning were meant "essentially to compare notes on how we view the international terrorist situation, since the United States and the Philippines are close partners in the international war on terrorism."
Negroponte flew to Australia from Hawaii before visiting the Philippines.
"If you are involved in the international war on terror, this is something that cannot be done alone," he said. "No one country can carry out these activities alone."
He declined to comment on political developments in the Philippines.
Negroponte was also ambassador to Honduras and Mexico. He left the Foreign Service in 1997 to become the executive vice president of McGraw-Hill publishing company. He returned to diplomacy as ambassador to the United Nations in 2001 and helped the US pitch the war on Iraq to the UN. Last year, he was named ambassador to Iraq.
At the Palace, Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita confirmed that Negroponte had separate meetings with the President and Gonzales Tuesday night where the latter gave a briefing on the governmentâs accomplishments in neutralizing terror suspects.
"The purpose of (former) Ambassador Negroponteâs visit is really to take a look at how things are with an allied country such as the Philippines as far as our counterterrorism program is concerned," Ermita said, adding that Negroponte might have wanted to check on the effectiveness of the intelligence exchange.
He however said the meeting with the President was more of a social function than anything else. |
Three suspected militants, two of them belonging to the Rajah Solaiman Movement, have been arrested in the Philippines, official sources said on Tuesday. They have been captured for their alleged participation in a series of bombings that killed 11 people and injured 60 others in Makati City, the financial district, and in Davao and General Santos cities in the south on February 14, police and military sources said.