GMA: Only communists oppose American military operations here

Only communist rebels oppose US military presence in Mindanao, President Arroyo said yesterday.

The President said the US troops joining Filipino soldiers running after the Abu Sayyaf in Basilan has popular support, with local communists as the only dissenters.

"Our people support this wholeheartedly," Mrs. Arroyo said in a radio interview.

Leftist groups have warned against escalating the US military presence to wage war on the 33-year-old communist insurgency.

Washington has placed both the Abu Sayyaf and the communist New People’s Army on its list of international terrorist organizations.

Mrs. Arroyo maintained that even Muslim-dominated areas in Mindanao, including Basilan, welcomed the US-presence as "they hope for deliverance from the Abu Sayyaf."

Meanwhile, a senior presidential aide and a pro-administration congressman dared critics of the controversial joint military exercise between the Philippines and the US to take their protest to the Supreme Court (SC) instead of burning American flags and defacing the US Embassy crest.

National Security Adviser Roilo Golez raised the challenge even as he asserted that the deployment of hundreds of US troops in Mindanao for a joint campaign against the Abu Sayyaf terrorists has the overwhelming support of the majority of Filipinos.

"It is not resolved by burning the flag of a friendly country, or by hurling invectives at the embassy of a friendly country," Golez said.

Various militant and leftist groups have vigorously opposed the US involvement in the Philippine efforts to quash the Abu Sayyaf which has caused international embarrassment because of its mass kidnapping for ransom victimizing foreigners and Filipinos alike.

Attempts by militants to deface the embassy crest have sparked clashes with riot police.

Golez pointed out that the justice department has ruled that the maneuvers in the South were perfectly legal as they are covered by the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA) between the two countries.

He said further challenges to the legality of the joint military exercise should be brought before the tribunal.

"If they (militant groups) are very confident about their position, then they should go there (SC)," Golez stressed.

Golez said nine out of 10 Filipinos were united on the need to crush the Abu Sayyaf which has been linked to the al-Qaeda network of Osama bin Laden, principal suspect in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in the US.

Golez said he found it strange that the leftist organizations objected to the temporary presence of the US troops, but were silent when China erected permanent structures on a disputed islet in the Spratly island group in the South China Sea in the mid-1990s.

For his part, Surigao del Sur Rep. Prospero Pichay said the debate over the US military presence has diverted public attention away from the crucial issue of dismantling the Abu Sayyaf terrorists "who have caused a negative Philippine image abroad, especially with prospective investors."

"If critics were denouncing the US military presence in Mindanao, then they should lodge heir protest with the High Court, which is after all the one true arbiter to answer questions of constitutionality," Pichay, who chairs the House committee on national defense, said in a statement.

He added that Mrs. Arroyo has already been guided by the legal opinion of the justice department. "It had opined that the presence of US forces to participate in an extended training exercise with Philippine troops was not in violation of the Constitution," he said.

Pichay urged the protesters to demonstrate instead against the Abu Sayyaf in Basilan.

"After all, it is the Abu Sayyaf crisis which is holding back the Philippines when all others in the ASEAN region have been moving forward," Pichay noted.

"There will be less bloodshed and an economic resurgence after the Abu Sayyaf bandits are done away with," he stressed.

Former Sen. Wigberto Tañada said about 50 militant groups have formed a coalition to put up a united opposition to the Balikatan.

Ma. Socorro Diokno, executive director of the Free Legal Assistance Group, said even pro-Estrada political leaders are free to join the coalition as long as they do not impose their own agenda.

Presidential Spokesman Rigoberto Tiglao urged Tañada’s group not to make the joint exercise an emotional issue.

"We have made it clear from the start that this is just a military exercise. There will be no combat operations for US troops nor there will be bases," Tiglao said.

At the same time, Tiglao dismissed an order by communist rebel leader Jose Ma. Sison to strongly oppose the Balikatan.

"This administration will not be intimidated by the communist threat," Tiglao said, adding that Sison had ordered his local wards to stir violence and dramatize their opposition.

He also expressed confidence that the bulk of the Filipino people, especially those hard-hit by the terrorist activities of the Abu Sayyaf, were supportive of the US military presence for a faster solution to the problem.

The Abu Sayyaf in Basilan still holds American Catholic missionary couple Martin and Gracia Burnham of Wichita, Kansas and Filipina nurse Deborah Yap.

The Burnhams were seized by Abu Sayyaf gunmen who swooped down on the posh Dos Palmas resort in Palawan on May 27 last year, while Yap was abducted during a siege on a hospital in Basilan as the Palawan raiders fled pursuing soldiers last June 2.

A third American captured in Dos Palmas, Guillermo Sobero of Corona, California was beheaded in June, along with a number of Filipino hostages.