Philippines, US discuss expanding military base access

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Updated 14 September 2023
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Philippines, US discuss expanding military base access

  • Manila gave Washington access to 4 new military bases earlier this year under joint defense pact
  • Philippines’ military chief says location of bases was selected for disaster response, humanitarian crisis

MANILA: Philippine and US military officials said on Thursday they may look to further expand areas covered in their joint defense agreement, which could give Washington more access to bases in the Philippines at a time when tensions are simmering in the South China Sea.
Manila granted the US entry to four more bases in strategic areas of the Philippines earlier this year, a move that riled Beijing as it gives Washington access to a total of nine military sites in the country under their 2014 Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement.
The four new bases are situated in strategic locations, with three of the sites facing north toward Taiwan and one near an island in the disputed South China Sea.
US Indo-Pacific Command head Adm. John Aquilino said he and the Philippines’ military chief Lt. Gen. Romeo Brawner Jr. have discussed the possibility of expanding the number of bases US forces could access.
“Gen. Brawner and I may make recommendations to our senior leaders for the consideration of additional sites, but there’s still work to do there before we get to that answer,” Aquilino told reporters after their meeting on Thursday. “We are in discussions.”
Ranking military officials led by Aquilino and Brawner were inspecting two of the four new EDCA sites on Wednesday, where various work is underway, including building a pier and repairing an airstrip.
The US has allocated over $100 million to develop sites in the Philippines, with over 90 projects having already been approved in the new locations.
“We are just opening this up for shared use with our counterpart, with our only ally the United States, because we believe that doing certain things together would bring more value,” Brawner said.
Some of the bases could be designed specifically for joint training, he said, while adding that locations of the sites agreed upon under EDCA have “nothing to do with other countries in the Indo-Pacific region.”
Brawner said: “What we are interested in really is to promote the interest of the Philippines. So the choices of the EDCA sites, for instance, are primarily because of considerations for humanitarian assistance and disaster response.”
The site visit this week “signifies our commitment to further strengthen our cooperation, ensuring that both militaries are prepared and well equipped to respond to evolving security challenges and humanitarian crises,” he added.
President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. has said that granting the US access to more military bases in his country was not intended for “any offensive action.”
The Philippines’ western command flagged concerns on Thursday over a “resurgence” of Chinese fishing vessels “swarming” in waters around the Spratly Islands inside Manila’s exclusive economic zone, following a series of similar encounters in the area in recent months.
The Chinese Ambassador to the Philippines Huang Xilian in April accused Manila of fueling geopolitical tension in the Asia-Pacific.
 


Senior UK judge slams political leaders over Gaza asylum verdict response

Updated 5 sec ago
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Senior UK judge slams political leaders over Gaza asylum verdict response

  • PM, opposition leader criticized decision to allow in Palestinian family under Ukraine refugee scheme 
  • Sue Carr: ‘It is really dangerous to make any criticism of a judgment without a full understanding of the facts and the law’

LONDON: The most senior judge in England and Wales has described as “unacceptable” comments by Prime Minister Keir Starmer and opposition leader Kemi Badenoch about a Palestinian family being given asylum in Britain.

Lady Chief Justice Baroness Sue Carr said she was “deeply troubled” after both leaders denounced a decision to take in the family from Gaza under a scheme originally set up for Ukrainian refugees.

At a press conference, Carr added that fears among the judiciary for their safety in the UK is at an “all-time high,” and it is not for politicians to question judges’ decisions made in accordance with the law.

The family of six, who are political opponents of Hamas, planned to stay in the country with a British relative who could provide shelter and financial support.

The two tribunal judges adjudicating the case made clear that their decision would not set a precedent for a Palestinian resettlement scheme in the UK.

However, the case was raised by Badenoch in Parliament last week, saying the decision to allow the family asylum in the UK is “completely wrong and can’t be allowed to stand.”

Starmer replied: “I don’t agree with the decision. The leader of the opposition is right that it’s the wrong decision.

“She hasn’t quite done her homework, however, because the decision in question was taken under the last government, according to their legal framework.”

He added: “It should be Parliament that makes the rules on immigration. It should be the government who make the policy. That’s the principle.

“The home secretary is already looking at the legal loophole that we need to close in this particular case.”

Carr said she had written to Starmer to express her feelings that “both the question and the answer were unacceptable.”

She added: “It is for the government visibly to respect and protect the independence of the judiciary. Where parties, including the government, disagree with their findings, they should do so through the appellate process.”

Carr said: “It is not acceptable for judges to be the subject of personal attacks for doing no more than their jobs.

“Their job is to find the facts on the evidence before them and apply the law as it stands to those facts.”

She added: “If they get it wrong, the protection is a challenge on appeal. If the legislation is wrong, it is Parliament’s prerogative to legislate.

“It is really dangerous to make any criticism of a judgment without a full understanding of the facts and the law.”


Suspected drug trafficker dies in Spain police boat chase

Updated 18 February 2025
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Suspected drug trafficker dies in Spain police boat chase

  • One of the passengers, a 23-year-old Moroccan, fell into the water during the chase
  • The Moroccan man died despite attempts by Civil Guard officers to resuscitate him, the spokesman added

MADRID: A suspected drug trafficker died on Monday night off the southern coast of Spain while being chased by a police boat, the authorities said Tuesday, the latest such incident in the region.
The chase began shortly before 10:00 p.m. when Spain’s Civil Guard spotted a suspicious boat loaded with packages with four people on board some 20 nautical miles from the mouth of the Guadalquivir River near the city of Cadiz, a spokesman for the police force told AFP.
One of the passengers, a 23-year-old Moroccan, fell into the water during the chase.
Police threw him a rope and a life preserver, and an officer jumped into the water to try to rescue the man but he “refused the help,” the spokesman said.
The Moroccan man died despite attempts by Civil Guard officers to resuscitate him, the spokesman added.
Police arrested two other passengers of the suspected drug boat while a fourth was also injured during the chase and was hospitalized.
The authorities seized some 600-700 kilos (1,300- 1,500 pounds) of a yet-to-be determined type of drug from the boat.
The mouth of Guadalquivir River is frequently the scene of chases between police and drug traffickers.
It is considered one of the main points of entry for drugs into Europe, due to its proximity to Morocco, a top cannabis producer.
In November 2024 a drug trafficker died in the region when the boat he was traveling in collided with a Civil Guard vessel during a chase.
And in September 2024 another drug trafficker died when his boat loaded with bales of hashish crashed at full speed into the banks of the Guadalquivir River while trying to escape from police.
Two police officers died at the start of 2024 after their boat was struck by a drug boat during a chase in the port of Barbate, in the province of Cadiz.
Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska deemed their deaths “murder” and vowed “zero impunity” against drug trafficking in the region.


France probes 2012 reporters’ deaths in Syria as crime against humanity

Updated 18 February 2025
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France probes 2012 reporters’ deaths in Syria as crime against humanity

  • US journalist Marie Colvin and French photographer Remi Ochlik were killed by an explosion in the east of the war-torn country
  • Edith Bouvier: ‘This wasn’t a case of us being in the wrong place at the wrong time — we were deliberately targeted’

PARIS: The French judiciary is investigating the 2012 deaths of reporters in Syria as a possible crime against humanity, anti-terror prosecutors told AFP on Tuesday.
Prominent US journalist Marie Colvin and French photographer Remi Ochlik were killed by an explosion in the east of the war-torn country in what a US court later ruled was an “unconscionable” attack that targeted journalists on the orders of the Syrian government.
The French judiciary had been treating the alleged attack as a potential war crime, but on December 17 widened the investigation to a possible crime against humanity, a charge for which French courts claim universal jurisdiction regardless of locations or nationalities involved.
The anti-terror prosecutors’ office told AFP that new evidence pointed to “the execution of a concerted plan against a group of civilians, including journalists, activists and defenders of human rights, as part of a wide-ranging or systematic attack.”
Colvin — a renowned war correspondent whose career was celebrated in a Golden Globe-nominated film “A Private War” — was killed in the Syrian army’s shelling of the Baba Amr Media Center in Homs on February 22, 2012.

The Washington federal court, which in 2019 ordered Syria to pay $302.5 million over her death, said in its verdict that Syrian military and intelligence had tracked the broadcasts of Colvin and other journalists covering the siege of Homs to the media center.
They then targeted it in an artillery barrage that killed Colvin and Ochlik.
French investigators also believe that both were “deliberately targeted.”
In addition, they told AFP, they extended the probe to cover suspected Syrian government “persecution” of civilians, including Colvin and Ochlik, as well as British photographer Paul Conroy and French reporter Edith Bouvier — who were wounded in the attack — and Syrian translator Wael Omar, as well as “other inhumane acts” committed against Bouvier.
One of Bouvier’s lawyers, Matthieu Bagard, said the new probe “opens the door to treat a certain number of procedures against journalists in armed conflict zones as crimes against humanity.”
His lawyer colleague, Marie Dose, called the shift in the investigation “a great step forward for war reporters.”
Clemence Bectarte, a lawyer for Ochlik’s family, said she now expected judges to issue arrest warrants “for the high-ranking political and military officials whose involvement has been established.”
In March 2012, France opened a probe for murder into the death of Ochlik and for attempted murder over the injury of Bouvier, both French nationals.

The probe was widened into potential war crimes in October 2014, and in 2016, non-French plaintiffs joined the legal action.
“This wasn’t a case of us being in the wrong place at the wrong time,” said Bouvier in 2013. “We were deliberately targeted.”
In 2016, then-Syrian president Bashar Assad claimed that Colvin was “responsible” for her own death.
“It’s a war and she came illegally to Syria,” he said, accusing the reporter of working “with the terrorists.”
The battle of Homs, Syria’s third city, was part a civil war triggered by the repression of a 2011 revolt against Assad’s government.
Colvin, who was 56 and working for the Sunday Times when she died, was known for her fearless reporting and signature black eye patch which she wore after losing sight in one eye in an explosion during Sri Lanka’s civil war.
Assad was ousted in December after rebels led by the Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS) Islamist group seized control of Damascus, ending more than 50 years of his family’s iron-fisted rule.


Pro-Russian hackers attack Italian websites after president compares invasion of Ukraine to Nazis

Updated 18 February 2025
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Pro-Russian hackers attack Italian websites after president compares invasion of Ukraine to Nazis

  • The NoName57 hacker group hit the websites of the defense, interior and transport ministries
  • The group on Monday said it attacked Italian banks, ports, airports and local transport agencies

MILAN: A pro-Russian hacker group attacked Italian government websites on Tuesday in what it said was a reaction to a speech by Italian President Sergio Mattarella that compared Russia’s invasion of Ukraine to the Nazis ‘ “wars of conquest.”
The NoName57 hacker group, which announced the attacks on social media, hit the websites of the defense, interior and transport ministries, as well as law enforcement agencies. Access to the sites was spotty.
The group on Monday said it attacked Italian banks, ports, airports and local transport agencies, but those attacks did not cause major disruptions.
Mattarella, asked about the attacks during a visit to Montenegro, said that he hoped Russia “will return to play a significant and important role in the international community, respecting the principals of international law and the dignity and sovereignty of every country.”
In a speech in Marseille, France, on Feb. 5 Mattarella said that patterns that led to World War II were repeating, including “wars of conquest.”
“This was the project of the Third Reich in Europe. Today’s Russian aggression against Europe is of this nature,’’ he said.
Russia’s foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova expressed dismay about Mattarella’s remarks.


New Delhi, Doha upgrade ties to strategic partnership during Qatari emir’s visit

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Qatari Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani lead a meeting in New Delhi.
Updated 18 February 2025
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New Delhi, Doha upgrade ties to strategic partnership during Qatari emir’s visit

  • Among GCC countries, India already has strategic partnerships with Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Oman, and Kuwait
  • India and Qatar set target to double bilateral trade within 5 years, from the current $14bn

NEW DELHI: India and Qatar elevated on Tuesday their ties to a strategic partnership, as Prime Minister Narendra Modi hosted Qatari Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani on his state visit to New Delhi — the first in nearly a decade.

On the two-day trip, the Qatari ruler was accompanied by a high-level delegation, including ministers and business leaders. This is his second official visit to India. The first was in March 2015.

Breaking with established norms, Modi personally welcomed the emir at the New Delhi airport as he arrived in the Indian capital on Monday evening. Their meeting was held at Hyderabad House on Tuesday afternoon.

“Both sides have today agreed to elevate their relationship to a strategic partnership, and India and Qatar have signed an agreement in this regard today,” Arun Kumar Chatterjee, international affairs secretary at the Ministry of External Affairs, told reporters after the meeting.

“What we are looking at is deepening cooperation in the fields of trade, energy investment, (and) security, as well as in the regional and international forum.”

Among Gulf Cooperation Council countries, India already has strategic partnerships with Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Oman, and Kuwait.

“Trade, investment and energy were among the major topics of discussion between the two leaders today. The trade today between India and Qatar is about $14 billion annually. Both sides have agreed to set a target to double this in the next five years,” Chatterjee said.

“Both leaders today identified a number of areas in which the Qatar Investment Authority can increase investments in India. This includes infrastructure, ports, shipbuilding, energy — including renewable energy, smart cities, food, parks, startups and new technologies such as artificial intelligence, robotics and machine learning.”

The QIA, Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund, currently has about $1.5 billion in direct foreign investment in India’s retail, power, IT, education, health, and housing sectors.

Indians make up the largest expatriate community in Qatar with over 700,000 Indian nationals living and working in the Gulf state.

An agreement on the avoidance of double taxation and prevention of fiscal evasion was also signed during the visit, as well as memoranda of understanding on cooperation in archives and documentation, youth affairs and sports.

Anil Trigunayat, former diplomat and a distinguished fellow at the Vivekananda International Foundation think tank in New Delhi, told Arab News that while the key feature of the visit was the “strategic partnership, which means greater collaboration in defense security, space and cyber cooperation,” it was significant not only for bilateral relations, “but also for exchanging views on the US approach to the region and ending the Gaza war, where Qatar is playing a critical role.”