An apology from The STAR

The article "Pinoy pilot lives to tell 1952 sky drama" published in the December 31, 2002, issue of The Philippine STAR concluded with a paragraph referring to Chito Sta. Romana and Jaime FlorCruz as having been involved in a later plane hijacking which was totally erroneous.

The editor – Mr. Ben Bernales – who wrote the story and appended the erroneous paragraph apologizes, stating: "I regret not having double-checked and confirmed the veracity of such an assertion which is utterly baseless in fact."

As Publisher and Chairman of The STAR, I do not myself edit or read before the newspaper comes out in print or on the website what appears. May I add that the above-mentioned paragraph came as a surprise to me.

In this connection, may I publish my own personal apology to my old friend, Jimmy FlorCruz, who was never involved in any illegal act and certainly not a reprehensible airplane hijack. Jimmy went to live and work in China on the invitation of the Philippine-China Friendship Association and spent decades there, becoming fluent in Mandarin, or Putonghua, which has made him invaluable as a journalist and observer of Chinese affairs.

(I meet with him whenever I visit the Chinese capital.) Jimmy, in fact, as President of the Beijing Foreign Correspondents Association (BFCA) was the one who inducted me into the association, giving me – in a sally of wit – the membership serial number of 007. FlorCruz, for several years, was TIME magazine correspondent, working alongside Sandra Burton, and later chief of that bureau. He is now, I believe, Beijing bureau chief of Cable News Network (CNN), and I watch him frequently on TV with great admiration for the meticulousness and sobriety of his reporting. I hope the inaccurate paragraph in these pages will not damage his standing in the CNN. Again, our profound apologies – and my best personal regards to Jimmy. – Max V. Soliven (Publisher/Chairman)