DFA: RP troops in Iraq to stay for 6 more months

A team of Filipino troops and humanitarian workers will remain in Iraq for six more months despite increasing attacks on coalition forces there, Foreign Secretary Delia Albert said in a statement yesterday.

Funds to maintain the 96-man contingent however were fast dwindling, Albert said while expressing the hope that the United Nations would soon have a more direct role in rebuilding Iraq.

"What is important is that we are making a difference in the lives of the people of Iraq. Our contingent members are doing us proud as they help address the humanitarian needs of Iraq and as they play an important role in building a strong, stable and democratic Iraq," she said.

A stable Iraq is important for the stability of the Middle East, where an estimated 1.5 million Filipino migrant workers are based, she added.

Meanwhile, Sen. Manuel Villar chided the Department of Foreign Affairs for planning to extend the stay of the Philippine Humanitarian Contingent in Iraq for six months.

"Our Filipino volunteers have done their part," he said. "It is time to bring them home."

Villar, chairman of the Senate committee on foreign relations, said the government should stop meddling in the affairs of other countries and focus on pressing local problems.

"What our country got in return for our help in rebuilding Iraq was a negative travel advisory from the US government," he said.

"Even American allies like Australia and the United Kingdom issued similar travel advisories against us."

Villar said the lives of the Filipino volunteers in Iraq could be endangered because of atrocities committed by anti-American forces.

"Anti-American groups have killed US and British soldiers, Spanish intelligence agents, and Japanese diplomats," he said.

"Are we waiting for a Filipino soldier to be killed?"

Villar, who also chairs the Senate finance committee, said there was also the matter of funding the continued stay of the Philippine Contingent in Iraq.

"The funds are said to be dwindling," he said. "Unfortunately, there is no explicit appropriation in the 2004 budget to support these troops."

However, Roy Cimatu, special envoy to the Middle East, said the work of the 96-member Philippine contingent in rehabilitating communities in Iraq is not yet over. — AFP, Marvin Sy