President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. is mulling over attending the United Nations General Assembly in New York in September, where he may deliver a speech, Philippine Ambassador to the United States Jose Manuel Romualdez said Thursday.
A side meeting with US President Joe Biden is possible at the UN, but Romualdez said he prefers a separate inaugural bilateral summit between Marcos and the American leader within the year in Washington, D.C.
Marcos may also have bilateral meetings with other leaders at the UNGA, which Romualdez described as “a very important occasion.”
“You can be sure that [with] the kind of publicity in the past weeks [since] he was inaugurated as [the] 17th president, a lot of people are very interested to hear him, to see him, to meet him. So that’s why very early on, even before the elections, I told him that I hoped one of the first trips that he would have in the Western world would be [to] the United Nations,” Romualdez told journalists.
The envoy said there is no definite date for Marcos’ bilateral meeting with Biden at the White House but hopes it will push through “before the end of the year or before November.”
Biden has extended an invitation to Marcos to visit Washington at a mutually agreed date, he said.
Romualdez said Marcos may have the chance to address the UN assembly as Philippine president in the early part of the two-week meeting.
“I think that he sees that as a valuable reason for him to be at the United Nations, that he will speak at the UN. It’s a very important occasion and a lot of heads of state will be there for sure,” the ambassador said.
Vice President Sara Duterte-Carpio is also scheduled to attend an education summit in New York in September before the UNGA, Romualdez said.
“On the bilateral, we have not yet gone there because personally, I would like to see President Marcos go to Washington, D.C. for a meeting with President Biden, and hopefully we can do that sometime before the end of the year, before November. But we have to look at the right timing for it, the invitation is open-ended,” he said.
Marcos’ predecessor, Rodrigo Duterte, received invitations to visit Washington from then US President Donald Trump and Biden but never went.
Marcos faces a potential legal issue in the US, where a district court has cited him and his mother, Imelda, for contempt for violating a court injunction.
But US Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman told a news conference in Manila last month that Marcos has immunity as president and can freely travel to the United States.
“The fact is, when you’re a head of state, you have immunity in all circumstances and are welcome to the United States in your official role,” Sherman said during her visit.