US, China pour aid into Batanes, PH island closest to Taiwan

by Frances Mangosing Inquirer.net

BASCO — Rival superpowers sought China’s help for food security.

United States and China are pouring aid into Batanes, the Philippines’ northernmost island closest to Taiwan, which Beijing considers its territory.

“The Chinese consulate in Laoag (City in Ilocos Norte) has pledged more than P3 million worth of assistance to develop a production farm in [the municipality of] Itbayat.

Analysts have said that selfruling Taiwan is a potential flashpoint in U.S.-China relations, with Washington as its most important backer.

She was later sentenced to death by musketry, but the sentence was suspended after new evidence emerged, suggesting that she was also victimized by a drug trafficking syndicate.

“I know my mother is just a victim and she is a good person and a good mother,” said Veloso’s son Mark, who was able to visit her in detention at Wonosari in Yogyakarta.

“I hope she will be given clemency at the soonest possible time, so we can be together. Our life in the Philippines may be simple, but what’s important is that we are together,” said Mark, who last saw his mother in 2019. n

Batanes Gov. Marilou Cayco announced the new forms of assistance pledged by Washington and Beijing during the island province’s 240th founding anniversary on Monday, June 26.

Cayco said the United States Agency for International Development and the Philippines’ Department of Information and Communications Technology would set up a Starlink premium service for a faster internet service across Basco, the provincial capital.

U.S. Embassy officials are also scheduled to visit next month, she added.

“They said they will bring some good news about our requests for assistance,” she noted in her speech, without offering other details.

But Cayco said she also

Chinese officials were here last month and vowed to continue helping us,” she said.

Food sufficiency has been a priority for the far-flung island province, especially during typhoons and earthquakes, as well as concerns over a possible Chinese military action against Taiwan. Farming and fishing are the main sources of food and income for the Ivatans.

Strategic location

An island chain and the country’s northernmost province where the Pacific Ocean merges with the South China Sea, Batanes is located less than 150 kilometers from its nearest point to the south of Taiwan. It has six municipalities and a population of 18,000.

Both the United States and China have been actively helping the strategically located province in recent years.

Beijing considers the island a part of its territory and has not ruled out taking it by force if necessary.

In April, Filipino and American troops trained to defend Batanes from potential aggressors as part of the “Balikatan” military exercises. Cayco said at the time that their residents were worried that the island would get caught in the crossfire amid the tensions between China and the United States over Taiwan.

The repeated calls to the national government from local officials to build bigger seaports and airports in anticipation of hosting thousands of Filipino repatriates in the event of a crisis over Taiwan appeared to be finally making headway.

Cayco said in the same speech that the Philippine Ports Authority would help in planning the construction of a seaport and their architects would soon start training for its planning. n

Gun culture

IN Cebu last week, police armed with a court warrant raided the home of the barangay captain of Baclayan in Boljoon town, and arrested Elderson Han Baldezamo Mabalatan on gun charges. The police reported confiscating from the village chief two .45-caliber pistols and a hand grenade.

Earlier on March 20, another village chairman who is president of the local association of barangay captains, Angelito de Mesa of Barangay Masaya in Bay, Laguna, was arrested following a police search of his home. The raiders reported seizing an M16 rifle equipped with a silencer and telescope, a 9mm machine pistol, ammunition and magazines for the guns.

The country has tough laws against illegal gun possession, with stiff penalties as provided under Republic Act 10591, the Comprehensive Firearms and Ammunition Regulation Act passed in 2013. Yet loose firearms continue to proliferate, promoting deadly violence that has marred politics and elections.

In this part of Asia, the Philippines has the second highest intentional homicide rate, ranking only behind Myanmar. Apart from thousands of drug suspects killed in the previous administration, the country has a long string of murders targeting activists, journalists and legal professionals.

Every electoral exercise in this country is marked by lethal violence, with candidates seeing murder

Babe’s Eye View

BABE ROMUALDEZ

“BY preserving the Philippines’ diplomatic relationship with China, while strengthening ties with the United States and regional allies, Marcos Jr. is performing a delicate balancing act.”

This was how Tokyo University of Foreign Studies lecturer Jenny Balboa described the foreign policy of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. in her article titled, “Marcos Jr.’s delicate balancing act between China and the United States” published last April at the East Asia Forum, an Australia-based international policy forum centered on the Asia Pacific region.

Being virtually at the center of the intensive competition between the United States and China, we obviously have to deal with both nations even as we also need to thresh out individual issues with them. However, there have been developments that indicate the willingness of both nations to continue to restart the conversation with each other, as seen in the recent visit of U.S. State Secretary Antony Blinken to Beijing, where he met with Chinese President Xi Jinping, who described the meeting as “very good,” saying that both sides “made progress and reached agreements on some specific issues.”

As President Xi himself

Human Face

AS we face the issue of whether or not the Philippines should accept some 50,000 refugees from Afghanistan that the United States government would be processing before they can become U.S. residents, one cannot help recalling the times our country became a halfway house, a foster home, so to speak, for those fleeing their homelands to seek friendly shores, if not the land oozing with milk and honey of their dreams.

The Philippines was never their country of choice as a final destination, and that sort of hurts the Pinoy ego. Well, but had they stayed, they would have contributed to this country’s population explosion. (No offense meant.) Nonetheless, refugees fleeing their respective countries as the ultimate tool for eliminating political rivals. The massacre of Negros Oriental governor Roel Degamo and nine others at his home has been linked to his family’s feud with the rival Teves clan. Deadly violence is employed even in races for the smallest unit of government, the barangay.

With the elections for the barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan set this October, the Philippine National Police says it is monitoring at least 49 active and potential private armed groups across the country. Whether the PNP can actually crack down on those groups is another story. Many private armies are maintained by influential politicians who are themselves keepers of large arsenals.

If a barangay captain can have an unlicensed grenade in his possession, think of what higher ranking officials are keeping. The alleged mastermind in Degamo’s murder, Negros Oriental 3rd District Rep. Arnolfo Teves Jr., his two sons and his brother, Bayawan town Mayor Pryde Henry Teves face charges over a cache of guns and explosives found in his property. Arnolfo Teves said the weapons were planted by the raiders.

The easy availability of all sorts of guns and even grenades plus the weakness of the criminal justice system have created a culture of violence