The Foreign ministers of Malaysia and Indonesia are set to meet with DFA Secretary Alan Peter Cayetano to talk about counterterrorism and how to combat extremists by intelligence sharing and preventing them from entering the country.
Although there are no exact date yet, Cayetano said Indonesian Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi had suggested that the Philippines host a meeting with her and Malaysian Foreign Minister Dato’ Sri Anifah Aman next week.
“What I can tell you, is that next week, Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines Foreign ministers plus top security personnel, will be meeting on counterterrorism and on fighting extremism,” Cayetano told reporters.
The DFA chief said that they plan to craft a group effort or an “inter-country effort” to be able to fend off extremists by “intelligence sharing.”
“To give you just a clear example. Kapag umalis ka naman ng Syria at Iraq hindi ka naman mateteleport sa Pilipinas, sa Indonesia or sa Malaysia, hindi ba? May mga pagdadaanan ka. So sharing this intelligence and coming up with ways to cooperate na maharang, mahuli, maidentify itong mga extemist, malaking malaking bagay for the region. Kung magcocooperate ng husto ang each country,” he explained.
During the meeting, Cayetano said the three officials will discuss enhanced cooperation on how the Association of the Southeast Asian Nations can play a major role in preventing the spillover from Iraq and Syria.
“We will be talking about enhanced cooperation so how we can deal with it tripartite with Indonesia and Malaysia, and how Asean can play a major role in preventing the spill over from Iraq and Syria,” Cayetano said.
After the meeting, he assured that they will make themselves available to the media. “But obviously we will be talking about many many things that are either classified, confidential or secret, he added.
It’s been more than three weeks since the Maute group, which claimed to have pledged allegiance to Iraq and Syria Islamic State, attacked the city of Marawi in Mindanao.
Meanwhile, Cayetano said that the Philippine government is ready to provide aid to thousands of victims of the Marawi firefight.
Cayetano said that there are different aid programs that are already operating.
“In terms of our aid program, Mindanao has been our focus the last few years and continues to be our focus. We have different programs that are already operating and we continue to support the Mindanao trust fund.”
Cayetano said that so far, there are no request from the Philippine government for support or assistance from the International communities.
Since the war in Marawi broke out, Cayetano said that the Philippine government has been providing assistance through the “Philippine Red Cross, Canadian Red Cross, and International Red Cross.”
“We are given assistance for dealing with different events so I’m sure some of that money are being used in Marawi City,” he said.