GMA off to US, Europe Sept. 25

President Arroyo is to fly to the United States to address the UN General Assembly this month, and then travel on to the Vatican and France, her spokesman said yesterday.

Mrs. Arroyo flies to New York on Sept. 25 to address the 56th session of the assembly and meet with UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, Presidential Spokesman Ignacio Bunye told reporters.

While in New York, she is also due to meet Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, ministers of the Organization of the Islamic Conference and officials of the US Institute for Peace, he said.

She will also speak before the Asia Society and the Council on Foreign Relations.

In New York, the presidential party will be billeted at the Waldorf Astoria, where Mrs. Arroyo will convene her international board of advisors. She is also set to meet with the Filipino-American community in Jersey City, New Jersey.

Mrs. Arroyo is due in Rome on Sept. 27 for an audience with Pope John Paul II at the Vatican.

The last stop of her tour is Paris on Sept. 29, where she will address a meeting of the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization.

The original plans for the President to fly to Saudi Arabia and Bahrain have been canceled and might be reset to a later date.

Mrs. Arroyo is scheduled to return to Manila on Sept. 30.

Bunye said rumored coup plots against the administration were "not necessarily" the principal reason for the cutting short of what was supposedly a 10-day trip, but they evidently had to be factored in.

"As far as I heard, it might be possible that the trips might be brief because our country is facing a lot of challenges that the President has to attend to," Bunye said in his daily press briefing at the Palace. — AFP, Marichu Villanueva