{"id":261043,"date":"2020-07-09T07:03:01","date_gmt":"2020-07-09T11:03:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=261043"},"modified":"2020-07-09T07:03:01","modified_gmt":"2020-07-09T11:03:01","slug":"no-new-directive-on-vfa-termination-palace","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2020\/07\/09\/no-new-directive-on-vfa-termination-palace\/","title":{"rendered":"No new directive on VFA termination: Palace"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque said President Rodrigo Duterte is not giving any fresh directive about the fate of VFA which was revoked by the Philippines. (PCOO file photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

MANILA<\/strong>\u00a0\u2013 The termination of the Philippines\u2019 Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA) with the United States (US) remains suspended and is not lifted, Malaca\u00f1ang said on Thursday.<\/p>\n

Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque said President Rodrigo Duterte is not giving any fresh directive about the fate of VFA which was revoked by the Philippines.<\/p>\n

\u201cHindi pa po nagbabago \u2018yung huling binitawang salita ni Presidente na ipagpapaliban po ng<\/em>\u00a0six months\u00a0yung pagte<\/em>-terminate\u00a0sa<\/em>\u00a0VFA (The President\u2019s recent directive about the VFA termination for six months remains the same),\u201d Roque said in a virtual presser aired on state-run PTV-4.<\/p>\n

Roque made the clarification a day after Senator Ronald dela Rosa, an administration ally, announced that the US embassy allowed him to reapply for a visa following Duterte\u2019s phone call with US President Donald Trump in April.<\/p>\n

Roque, nevertheless, said the Palace was elated by the US\u2019s latest decision to allow Dela Rosa to process his visa.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo\u00a0nagagalak po kami na nalinawan ang mga Amerikano na hindi dapat ganiyan ang pag-trato sa mga halal ng taumbayan ng mga Pilipinong opisyal<\/em>\u00a0(We are happy that Americans now realize that they should not treat elected Philippine officials that way),\u201d Roque said.<\/p>\n

Duterte scrapped the VFA following the cancellation of Dela Rosa\u2019s US visa, as well as the criticism of some US senators against his drug war.<\/p>\n

The VFA, a military pact signed between the Philippines and the US in 1998, allows American troops who are participating in joint military deals to visit Manila sans passport and visa.<\/p>\n

The VFA was supposed to be abrogated 180 days after the Philippines sent a formal notice of termination to the US on February 11.<\/p>\n

However, Manila notified Washington in June about Duterte\u2019s decision to suspend the revocation of the VFA.<\/p>\n

The abrogation of the military deal between the two countries was suspended \u201cin light of political and other developments in the region.\u201d<\/p>\n

The suspension of VFA\u2019s termination is effective for six months but can be extended by the Philippines for another six months, according to the diplomatic note dated June 1 and addressed to the US.<\/p>\n

Roque said nothing has changed when it comes to Duterte\u2019s stance on VFA.<\/p>\n

\u201cIyan pa rin po ang posisyon<\/em>\u00a0(The position remains the same),\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MANILA\u00a0\u2013 The termination of the Philippines\u2019 Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA) with the United States (US) remains suspended and is not …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":259452,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,95],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-261043","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","category-news-ph","mauthors-ruth-abbey-gita-carlos","mauthors-philippine-news-agency"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/261043","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=261043"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/261043\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":261046,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/261043\/revisions\/261046"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/259452"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=261043"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=261043"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=261043"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}