GMA: No ‘laundry list’ in meeting with Bush

WASHINGTON (via PLDT) — President Arroyo said she will not be presenting a "laundry list" of things urgently needed by the country to US President George W. Bush when they meet for talks today at the White House.

Mrs. Arroyo said they will discuss the global threat of terrorism but she sidestepped Filipino reporters’ questions about her specific talking points with Bush.

"I am not here with a laundry list. I am here to discuss a new global environment and what we need to address the security and economic challenges of the new global environment," she told a press conference with Filipino reporters accompanying her on her state visit.

She came to Washington to discuss matters of mutual concern to the US as a partner in the war against terrorism, Mrs. Arroyo said.

"And since there are different alliances all over the world, it is important that each nation must be responsible for the security of their own nation," she said.

"In our region, we have different views on the US. So it’s important that we must be able to prove that our friendship with the US is important for the security of our region. These things are the matters we would discuss," the President said.

A staunch supporter of the US-led campaign against terrorism, Mrs. Arroyo said a stronger Philippine-US
security alliance is necessary to win the battle against terrorism in Southeast Asia.

"So these are the things I am going to talk about with President Bush. Now where these talks would lead to can come as they crop up," she said.

"But I’m not going to sit down there to say ‘I want these things.’ This is not the way to conduct this meeting. What we would talk about is the analysis of events and situation and what we must do."

Speaker Jose de Venecia Jr. told The STAR that Mrs. Arroyo would also suggest to Bush the possibility of creating a United Nations council that would promote understanding between religions.

"Certainly, the global community needs to access the intellectual and moral influence of men and women of conscience, wisdom and compassion," he said.

The Abu Sayyaf Islamic kidnap gang, notorious for beheadings, kidnappings and other attacks, operates in southern Mindanao and is to be the target of a six-month counter-terrorism training exercises by US and Philippine forces that could start as early as next month.

The group is on the US list of terrorist organizations and had been linked by both governments to the al-Qaeda terrorist network of Osama bin Laden.

"We must recognize that terrorism knows no borders, no boundaries. It strikes anywhere it wants. So we must have unity and cooperation in the region and in the entire world," Mrs. Arroyo said.

"We should be united in the same way we fight to stop the spread of an epidemic like SARS. We should have the same unity in the fight against terrorism because it might become like an epidemic if we are not able to address the poverty problems, which are the source of recruits for terrorists."

Mrs. Arroyo made a similar appeal in a dinner reception hosted for her by the Filipino community here at Capitol Hilton Hotel.

She thanked the uniformed Filipino-American soldiers in the audience who had just returned from the recently concluded war in Iraq for their contribution "in the fight against terrorism in the Philippines and in Iraq, and wherever else the threat of terrorism calls them." — With Paolo Romero