“To be honest, this year will be a slow start. We will ramp up by the middle of the year starting the second quarter,” Acting Socioeconomic Planning Secretary and NEDA chief Karl Kendrick Chua said in a virtual forum organized by the Foreign Correspondents Association of the Philippines (FOCAP).
Handout from Philippines Air Force
The United States is a “stabilizing force” in the disputed South China Sea and the Indo-Pacific region, the Philippine defense chief said Friday, adding that Manila was optimistic about a “new era” of ties with Washington under the Biden presidency.
Manila likely will keep pursuing an independent foreign policy, but is also expected to prolong a decades-old friendly relationship with the U.S. through dealings with the new administration in Washington, Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana said.
“As for our challenges ahead, the longstanding rivalry between the United States and China will surely continue to test our adeptness in balancing our relations with both countries,” Lorenzana told a forum organized by the Foreign Correspondents Association of the Philippines (FOCAP).
"As for our challenges ahead, the longstanding geopolitical rivalry between the United States and China will surely continue to test our adeptness in balancing our relations in all countries," Lorenzana said at a virtual forum of the Foreign Correspondents Association of the Philippines.
By LLANESCA T. PANTI, GMA News
Published January 29, 2021 11:27am At least 56 million of COVID-19 vaccine doses made by American pharmaceutical companies are expected to arrive in the Philippines by May, Philippine Ambassador to the United States Jose Manuel Romualdez said Friday. Romualdez said that these COVID-19 vaccine doses will be delivered to the Philippines under the COVAX facility a global collaboration of manufacturers and experts that seeks to accelerate the development, production, and equitable access to COVID-19 tests, treatments, and vaccines. “Since May 2020, we have been reaching out to pharmaceutical companies here to secure immediate access to COVID-19 vaccine supply, a pathway to sustainable supply and even co-manufacturing the vaccine with Philippine entities, and I am happy to report that these [initiatives] have been fruitful,” Romualdez said at a virtual forum of the Foreign Correspondents Association of the Philippines (FOCAP).
Jeoffrey Maitem/BenarNews
The head of the transitional government of a Muslim autonomous area in the southern Philippines said Friday he had reached out to Islamic State-linked militants in a bid to stave off violence that threatens peace in the region.
Murad Ebrahim told reporters that he had made preliminary contact with members of the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF) as well as the Abu Sayyaf Group in efforts to persuade them to come into the fold of the law.
“We are opening a dialogue with them… [and] convincing them to join us, the government,” Murad told the Foreign Correspondents Association of the Philippines (FOCAP) during its annual Prospects forum.