{"id":49776,"date":"2015-05-18T17:32:22","date_gmt":"2015-05-18T09:32:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=49776"},"modified":"2015-05-18T17:35:24","modified_gmt":"2015-05-18T09:35:24","slug":"coloma-reiterates-govt-commitment-to-aid-refugees-vis-a-vis-existing-laws","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2015\/05\/18\/coloma-reiterates-govt-commitment-to-aid-refugees-vis-a-vis-existing-laws\/","title":{"rendered":"Coloma reiterates gov&#8217;t commitment to aid refugees vis-a-vis existing laws"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"getty embed image\" style=\"background-color:#fff;display:inline-block;font-family:'Helvetica Neue',Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;color:#a7a7a7;font-size:11px;width:100%;max-width:594px;\">\n<div style=\"overflow:hidden;position:relative;height:0;padding:66.666667% 0 0 0;width:100%;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"\/\/embed.gettyimages.com\/embed\/473125634?et=uZCb5ejpRnRMSpo6Z1x34w&#038;viewMoreLink=on&#038;sig=-tNgXKucL8HqaBUyw5bMK-orlQmzP6ItoryM452B0t0=&#038;caption=true\" width=\"594\" height=\"396\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"display:inline-block;position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p style=\"margin:0;\">\n<div style=\"padding:0;margin:0 0 0 10px;text-align:left;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/473125634\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color:#a7a7a7;text-decoration:none;font-weight:normal !important;border:none;display:inline-block;\">View image<\/a> | <a href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color:#a7a7a7;text-decoration:none;font-weight:normal !important;border:none;display:inline-block;\">gettyimages.com<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>MANILA -\u2013 Malacanang on Monday stressed the government\u2019s commitment to help refugees in line with existing international rules.<\/p>\n<p>This after the Philippine Daily Inquirer published a report dated May 18, 2015 saying the Philippine government will push back to sea undocumented Asian \u201cboat people\u201d or those who are fleeing from their countries due to political conflict among others.<\/p>\n<p>Presidential Communications Operations Office (PCOO) Secretary Herminio Coloma Jr. said the Philippine government \u201chas extended humanitarian assistance to &#8216;boat people&#8217;\u201d and had even established a processing center for Vietnamese travellers in the seventies.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201dWhat was cited in the Philippine Daily Inquirer report (18 May 2015) was a mere restatement of applicable provisions of our existing laws,\u201d Coloma pointed out.<\/p>\n<p>After the Vietnam War in the 1970s, some 2,000 refugees from that country were allowed by the Philippine government to stay in Puerto Princesa, Palawan, in western Philippines.<\/p>\n<p>The place where they are currently staying was named \u201cViet Village.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>However, most of the refugees have relocated in the US, Canada and several other countries.<\/p>\n<p>Coloma stressed that \u201cthe Philippines, as a state party to relevant instruments, such as the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, concretely manifested its solidarity with the United Nations in providing succor and relief to persons involuntarily displaced from their homelands as a consequence of political conflict.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe shall continue to do our share in saving lives under existing and long-standing mechanisms pursuant to our commitments under the Convention,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p>A Reuters story said some 6,000 Bangladeshis and Rohingya Muslims from Myanmar were left recently at sea by smugglers.<\/p>\n<p>These are in addition to the thousands who have fled their countries and seek refuge in several Asian countries like Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>View image | gettyimages.com MANILA -\u2013 Malacanang on Monday stressed the government\u2019s commitment to help refugees in line with existing &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":49780,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1482,1145,95],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-49776","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-breaking","category-headline","category-news-ph","mauthors-joann-santiago","mauthors-philippines-news-agency"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49776","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=49776"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49776\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/49780"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=49776"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=49776"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=49776"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}