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For the past 20 years, The Filipino Express has provided the Filipino American community the best news, arts and entertainment coverage from around the United States and the Philippines.
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This website includes selected articles from this week's edition of the Filipino Express. Not all the stories published in the printed version appear on this site.
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LONDON -- British authorities say they have foiled a plan to blow up aircraft flying from Britain to the United States. More stringent security restrictions were immediately ordered at British airports, and air traffic in and out of Britain was severely disrupted.
Deputy Police Commissioner Paul Stephenson said Thursday that police and security services intercepted what they believe was a plot to blow up several U.S.-bound aircraft.
“We believe that the terrorists’ aim was to smuggle explosives onto airplanes in hand luggage and to detonate these in flight,” Stephenson says. “We also believe that the intended targets were flights from the United Kingdom to the United States of America.”
Reports say up to 10 airplanes were targeted. Exactly how far along the plot had actually advanced was not revealed. But Commissioner Stephenson said the plot was a serious one.
“We cannot stress too highly the severity that this plot represented,” Stephenson says. “Put simply, this was intended to be mass murder on an unimaginable scale.”
He said police initially detained 21 people in connection with the plot, and that the investigation is continuing. Most were arrested in London, but raids were also carried out also in the capital’s suburbs and in the city of Birmingham.
The security threat level was raised to “critical,” the highest such level in Britain.
All flights coming into Britain were canceled, and many outgoing flights were either delayed or canceled altogether.
The inter-connected nature of international air travel meant the disruption caused by chaos at Heathrow in the wake of the new measures was rippling out across the world.
In Manila, the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) was placed on heightened security alert effective 7 p.m. Thursday following the reported uncovering by Scotland Yard of a major terrorist plot which disrupted flights at London’s Heathrow Airport.
Protective security measures include “the rigid inspection of vehicles at all security checkpoints leading to the airport,” the Manila International Airport Authority said in a memo.
It did not say what security measures would be implemented with regard to passengers’ luggage and hand carried bags.
The memo was signed by retired general Angel Atutubo, Miaa assistant general manager for security and emergency services.
It was released to the media at 6:30 pm.
As of press time, the Airport Security Committee was in an emergency meeting to discuss the security measures to be implemented at the NAIA in light of the latest terrorist threat.
Elsewhere in Asia, Japanese airlines said they were waiting for further information and that it was highly possible they would have to cancel flights to Britain.
Thai Airways said one of its flights took off for Heathrow around 0500 GMT.
Other flights to London were to leave Bangkok around 1700 GMT and so far none had been delayed or cancelled, a spokesman said.
Airport officials and travel agents in China reported no cancellations or delays of flights although Hong Kong’s flag carrier Cathay Pacific warned of delays going to London.
British anti-terrorist police said the plot involved explosives concealed in hand luggage, which led to security being beefed up at most of Britain’s airports.
British Home Secretary John Reid said police were confident that the main suspects in the plot “have been accounted for” but explained that the country’s security alert had been raised to its highest level -- “critical” -- as a precautionary measure.
As a result, passengers on flights from around the world which were still flying to Britain were subjected to new security restrictions and increased checks.Hand luggage was banned, except for items such as baby food and some medicines.
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LEGAZPI -- Philippine scientists gave renewed warnings of a major explosion at the erupting Mayon volcano Thursday, as steaming lava poured down its slopes and thousands huddled in evacuation camps.
Mayon’s chief monitor Ernesto Corpuz said the volcano, which has been rumbling and oozing molten rock for about three weeks, may erupt in spectacular fashion in the coming days.
“It is at this time that the volcanic activity could be gearing up for a bigger explosion,” Corpuz said.
“This is going to be a critical time,” he said, adding: “This kind of unusual quiet is ominous.”
Official warnings about Mayon, the country’s most active volcano which has claimed more than 1,000 lives over the years, have forced the evacuation of some 40,000 villagers from around the central mountain.
While obvious signs of activity have slackened in the past two days, lava continues to pour down gullies on the slopes of the picturesque, cone-shaped mountain which is a major tourist attraction.
About 40,000 people have been evacuated from villages within a six to eight kilometer (four-five mile) danger zone since Monday in case of an explosion that could cover surrounding areas with deadly volcanic ash.
The residents have been herded into makeshift evacuation centers, mainly school buildings where sometimes as many as 50 people are sleeping on cold cement classroom floors.
The evacuated villagers are living on rations of rice, instant noodles and canned sardines and meat. Local officials warn that money for their upkeep might soon run out if the crisis is prolonged.
There are also fears that the overcrowding in the evacuation centers could spawn an epidemic.
The 8,070-foot (2,460-meter) Mayon has shown increasing unrest since mid-July and on Monday, after a series of powerful explosions, government volcanologists warned a dangerous eruption could take place within days.
The number of volcanic quakes detected in Mayon fell to only three on Wednesday from 109 on Monday and 21 on Tuesday. The amount of sulphur dioxide expelled also has been falling, the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology said.
However crimson streams of lava could still be seen trickling down Mayon’s slopes at night and a huge column of steaming lava is still moving through a gulley in the Bonga district.
Soldiers have been assigned to patrol forests on the foothills to keep residents out of the danger zone. However some farmers and herdsmen still sneak into the area to check on their crops and to safeguard their homes.
The troops said they are seeing fewer farmers braving the danger zone now that the lava has moved lower.
“They are more afraid now,” one soldier said.
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CHICAGO, Illinois – Former Philippine Department of Agriculture Undersecretary Jocelyn “Joc-Joc” I. Bolante should not be granted an asylum in the United States because he is escaping “prosecution not persecution” from Philippine authorities.
In a pre-emptive move, urging the US Immigration Court in Chicago to deny Bolante’s effort to fight off his deportation, a petition for leave to appear as amicus curiae (friends of court) was filed August 7 by Philippine lawyers who are members of the University of the Philippines Law Center Institute of International Legal Studies (UPLC-IILS), arguing that “being a fugitive from Philippine justice being sought for complicity in a corruption scandal in which he played key role as ranking official of the Philippine Department of Agriculture, Bolante does not fall under the meaning of a “refugee” eligible for a grant of asylum under both US jurisprudence and international laws.”
The Filipino lawyers composed of Prof. Harry L. Roque, Jr., Dr. Raul C. Pangalangan and Prof. Merlin M. Magallona added that Bolante “has not shown any proof of a well-founded fear of persecution for his political opinions as to qualify him to the right of non-refoulement under international law, or to the right to restriction on removal under US law.”
Elaine Komis, legislative and public affairs spokesperson of the Executive Office for Immigration Review under the US
Department of Justice, said Bolante is being charged with violation of the Immigration and Nationality Act’s Section 212(a)(7)(A)(i)(I), a “ground for inadmissibility for not (being) in possession of a valid unexpired ... entry document.”
Ms. Komis also told this reporter that the case of Bolante was being moved from San Pedro (California) Immigration Court to Chicago Immigration Court but no hearing has yet been set.
In filing the brief, the Filipino lawyers told the Chicago Immigration Court that as “academics in the field of international law and as citizens of the Philippines,” they have “interest in the proper administration of asylum law with respect to applicant (Bolante).”
A DEFEAT OF THE ENDS OF JUSTICE
They claimed that a “grant of Mr. Bolante’s request would defeat the demands and ends of justice in his home country, where he is being sought for direct complicity in a corruption scandal that has rocked the highest public offices in the Philippines, including the office of the President.”
The 40-page copy of the petition was submitted by UP alumna Maria Carmen R. Madrid-Crost, a Chicago-based immigration lawyer, on behalf of the UPLC-IILS as early as August 4 in Chicago before the office of the Department of Homeland Security, which has custody of Mr. Bolante. But the brief was not accepted as Bolante’s files at that time were not yet in Chicago.
Attorney Madrid-Crost said it was finally submitted on August 7 and she is awaiting word from the US Immigration Judge comments on the brief. Madrid-Crost said the case is going to be handled by Judge George P. Katsivales.
ABUSE OF RIGHT
The petition alleged that the grant of Mr. Bolante’s request for “asylum constitutes an abuse of a right that should not be countenanced by any Receiving State under international law.”
Prior to Bolante’s custody by US authorities, the petition said that Mr. Bolante “occupied a powerful government position(s) and enjoyed the Philippine President’s protection and favor.” Bolante was detained on July 7 when he arrived at the Los Angeles International Airport.
Bolante has “also been identified as a close associate of the President’s husband, Mr. Mike Arroyo.”
The petition alleged that Bolante “masterminded the scam that benefited the candidacy of Mrs. Arroyo in the last presidential elections, according to a report of the Philippine Senate on the election campaign fund corruption case.”
The scam, according to the petition, involves 728-M pesos (US$5.4-M) that has been the subject of an impeachment complaint pending with the Philippine House of Representatives against Mrs. Arroyo.
3 BILLION AGRI MONEY
The amount is part of a “trail of nearly 3-billion pesos released by the Department of Agriculture during the 2004 presidential campaign” originally intended to subsidize poor farmers in the countryside, quoting the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism.
Big chunks of that money were diverted to “congressmen, mayors and governors who were allies of President Arroyo,” and that “a portion of the money mysteriously ended up in the hands of obscure private foundations and companies” and eventually “siphoned to the Arroyo campaign.”
The petition claimed that Bolante can not claim “to be persecuted because after all, he once belonged to the ruling party as a top official with close ties to no less than the President herself and her husband.”
Bolante could not even make a “motherhood statement about a supposed plot by the communist group NPA to kill him” to support a “well-founded fear of persecution, citing a disclaimer from a NPA spokesman that Bolante is a “target of an alleged NPA assassination plot.”
The petition urged the Immigration Court to deny Bolante’s request for asylum and restriction on removal and immediately deport him to the Philippines to face charges in connection with his complicity in the 728-M pesos fertilizer fund scam.
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JERSEY CITY, NJ — In a bid to provide a voice to Filipino Americans and to be the first Fil-Am U.S. Congressman, Hawaii State Senator Ron Menor will hold a fund-raising on August 19 at Fiesta Grill restaurant on 819 West Side Ave., Jersey City from 1 to 5 p.m.
“During my 22 years of service at the state legislature, I have worked to protect Hawaii’s consumers, strengthen healthcare services, encourage economic growth and job creation, promote affordable housing, improve our public schools, and address other quality-of-life issues,” said Menor in a statement on his website.
Menor, who is married to Patricia Ann and has two grown up kids, has been a state Senator, 17th Senatorial District in Hawaii from 2000 to the present. He is the chairman, committee on commerce, consumer protection and housing.
Aiming to greatly empower Filipino Americans, Menor advocates for equal benefits for Filipino American veterans who fought side by side with American troops during World War ll.
As chair of National Federation of Filipino American Associations (Naffaa) Pacific-Hawaii region, Menor wants to give a stronger voice to Filipino Americans by encouraging them to run in public office.
Menor wants to make a history by becoming the first Filipino American to serve on the halls of U.S. Congress in Washington, D.C.
He initiated civic services to the Philippines that include sending humanitarian aid to victims of disasters and catastrophe.
For those who wish to attend the fundraising, please contact the following: Ludy Corrales (908) 693-4277, Ed Toloza (201) 936-9018, Ador Equipado (201) 333-4739, Carmen Flores (201) 433-7391 Menor was State Senator in the 6th Senatorial District from 1986 to 1990.
He was three term State Representative, from 1992 to 2000 and from 1982 to 1985.
The son of the late Benjamin Menor, the first Hawaii Supreme Court Justice of Philippine ancestry. Both of Ron’s parents are Ilocano descent.
He obtained his law degree from Georgetown University.
He was a former Deputy Attorney General in Hawaii.
Recognized by Honolulu Star Bulletin as one of five outstanding freshmen legislators. He was selected by the Honolulu Jaycees as one of 3 outstanding young persons in the State of Hawaii.
Recognized by Honolulu Star Bulletin as one of five outstanding freshmen legislators. He was selected by the Honolulu Jaycees as one of 3 outstanding young persons in the State of Hawaii With your help; I’ll carry on the fight for the values we share. I am confident I can represent you effectively in Congress, using the experience and the knowledge of government I’ve gained during my years in public service,” said Menor.
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