RP airports prone to missile attacks?

Aircraft landing or taking off from airports in the Philippines could be vulnerable to attacks by terrorists using shoulder-fired missiles, the chairman of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum’s anti-terrorism task force said yesterday.

Former Armed Forces chief Gen. Benjamin Defensor, the Philippines’ top envoy on counterterrorism and chairman of the APEC anti-terrorism task force, revealed the possibility and called for a threat review by countries in the Pacific region.

Defensor stressed that aircraft landing or taking off from airports, particularly in the Philippines, could be vulnerable to attacks by terrorists using shoulder-fired missiles.

"I will tell you right now, our airports are not safe," Defensor told the Foreign Correspondents Association of the Philippines (FOCAP).

His warning comes amid reports that al-Qaeda-linked militants have been boosting contacts with Muslim groups in the country.

The new security threat prompted the 21-nation grouping — which includes the United States, Japan, China, Russia, South Korea, Australia and Canada — to agree late last year to boost security in the aviation sector.

He said each member country would be required to submit assessments this year on threats facing their airports after defense analysts said that man-portable air defense systems, shoulder-fired missiles (known as manpads) posed a serious threat to regional carriers.

Defensor explained manpads are traditionally used in conventional warfare to defend against enemy aircraft but could also be used against commercial aircraft.

The Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) and other airports could be especially vulnerable because of the close proximity of many of them to sprawling shantytowns, Defensor said.

"Most of our airports, when they started, had open areas on both ends of the runway. But now they are full of residents. People who go there are not authorized to be there, but they are there," he said.

Large concentrations of people have sprung up around airports across Asia, putting residents at risk from rocket attacks as planes take off and land, he said.

Large concentrations of people have sprung up around airports across Asia, putting residents at risk from rocket attacks as planes take off and land, he said.

"Are we going to say that we will prevent people from going to where the aircraft are, as they have done in Los Angeles?" Defensor asked. "These are the things that will form part of our analysis and we will make a proper recommendation."

Such anti-aircraft weapons, Defensor said, are also available in the Philippines, where Muslim insurgents for years have manufactured shoulder-fired rocket launchers in training camps in Mindanao.

A shoulder-fired rocket was supposed to be an air defense weapon, Defensor pointed out.

"But it can also be used against commercial aircraft carrying civilians... that is the bigger threat we have found," he added.

The weapon is "very popular," Defensor said. "You can place it in your luggage, assemble it and you have a deadly weapon. And there are so many of them sold all over the world at rock-bottom prices. That is the danger."

Fears that shoulder-fired missiles have become a terrorist tool have grown since suspected extremists fired SA-7 missiles that narrowly missed a Boeing airliner with Israeli civilians in Mombasa, Kenya in 2002.

Defensor said security would be analyzed at NAIA, the Diosdado Macapagal Airport at the Clark economic zone in Pampanga, and the main hubs of Cebu and the Davao International Airport in Mindanao.

A panel of APEC experts would then determine the safety of each airport after which corrective measures could be recommended, Defensor said.

"We have to make do with what we have (here)," Defensor said. "We do not have fighter jets. We do not have the radar we are looking for."

At more than 36,000 kilometers long, the Philippine coastline is seen as a weak link in the Asian war on terror, allowing the regional network Jemaah Islamiyah to keep close links with local Muslim extremists in Mindanao. — AFP, AP