President Rodrigo Duterte may open the country’s military facilities to the United States should the Ukraine-Russia crisis spill over to Asia, Philippine Ambassador to the US Jose Manuel Romualdez said Thursday.
Romualdez made the remark when asked if the Chief Executive would be attending the upcoming Asean-US Summit in Washington DC.
“(The President) was half and half about it. He says that there is no real compelling reason for him to attend. He said if they’re asking for the support of the Philippines, he was very clear that if push comes to shove, the Philippines will be ready to be part of the effort, especially if this Ukrainian crisis spills over to the Asian region,” the envoy shared.
“He offered that the Philippines would be ready to open its doors, especially to our ally the United States in using our facilities, any facilities they may need,” he added.
The envoy said Duterte might allow the use of Clark for “some of the aircraft that the US may need for supplies” or Subic for the US Navy in the context of an “emergency situation.” The former US air and naval bases were stationed in Clark and Subic before these were closed in 1992.
“Let’s pray it does not happen but if it spreads out in the Asian region for some reason or another, the President obviously sees that need for us to make a choice and our choice is obviously… since we have an MDT (Mutual Defense Treaty) with the US, we have this special relationship and military alliance, he said he is allowing the use of facilities,” he said.
The MDT is an accord signed in 1951 that stipulates that the Philippines and the US would support each other if either of them were to be attacked by an external party.
At the end of the forum, Romualdez said while Duterte values the friendship that he made with Russian President Vladimir Putin, “he knows that this thing that’s happening right now in Ukraine is obviously something that should not have happened because it was unprovoked.”
In a separate virtual event hosted by the Rotary Club of Manila, Romualdez said Russia’s nuclear weapons are a matter of grave concern for everyone in the world.
“You can just imagine the thin line that they have to traverse, both for the US and the NATO nations. Let’s just hope and pray that this will not be something like what happened in World War II, we have to always think back on what happened during those days when Hitler decided to go to Poland and extend it to the rest of Europe and it spilled over to the Asian region,” he said.
The Department of Foreign Affairs on Thursday said more than 250 Filipinos in Ukraine are now out of danger.
Foreign Affairs Secretary Sarah Lou Arriola said that a total of 259 Filipinos have been taken out of Ukraine, 90 of them were already repatriated while 169 nationals are in various safe borders near Ukraine.
Arriola said of the 169 Filipinos evacuated from the war-torn European country, 60 of them are expected to arrive in Manila on Thursday.
The DFA earlier said that of the 90 Filipinos, who have already returned home, 55 are seafarers.
On Wednesday, March 9, a total of 29 seafarers arrived in the Philippines. They are the crew members of MV Global Aglaia, MV Joseph Schulte, and MV Star Helena.
The DFA said they exited Ukraine to evacuate to Moldova with the assistance of the Philippine Honorary Consulate in Chisinau and the Philippine Embassy in Budapest. They then left for the Philippines from Bucharest, Romania.
The Foreign Affairs department expects more seafarers to arrive in the country in the next few days through its evacuation and repatriation programs.
Arriola said on Wednesday that they are having a hard time evacuating seafarers, particularly those stranded at the Black Sea.
She added that they could not leave their vessels due to the “heavy fighting” and they could only hunker down and take cover amid the intense firing. However, she assured the public that the government will keep working with Philippine embassies and consulates in the embattled country and its nearby territories to get them out of danger
Earlier, the DFA raised to Alert Level 4 all areas in Ukraine due to the “rapidly deteriorating security situation” in the Eastern European country.
The department said Alert Level 4 or mandatory repatriation is issued when there is “large-scale internal conflict or full-blown external attack” in a certain destination.
The Philippines earlier appealed for an immediate cessation of violence in Ukraine, and called on the parties involved to forge a peace accord.