BI: Foreigners in RP not in terrorists’ list

CLARK FIELD, Pampanga — The 4,500 long-time residents and newly arrived foreigners in the country are not in the list of 180 suspected terrorists who are wanted by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Immigration Commissioner Andrea Domingo said yesterday.

Domingo told The STAR the Bureau of Immigration has finished checking the records of the foreigners and none of them supposedly fit the profile provided by the FBI.

Domingo, however, revealed that a total of 23 foreign fugitives were arrested and deported by the agency since the start of the year.

Among the fugitives arrested and deported were nine Koreans, six Americans, two Japanese, a Taiwanese, a Chinese, a Frenchman, a Swede and a New Zealander.

The most notorious of them was Alfred Sirven, a French national, who was arrested in Tagaytay City on Feb. 2 after three years of hiding in the country. The former No. 2 man in the French firm Elf Aquitane was wanted for large-scale corruption.

Also deported was Brian James Curtis of New Zealand, a convicted heroine trafficker, who was arrested on July 3 in San Andres, Manila where he had been hiding after escaping from an Auckland prison.

"Our records show that none of the foreign nationals who have been staying in the country for years now and those who have come after the terrorist attacks on the US on Sept. 11 were among those in the FBI list," Domingo said.

"At this time, it seems there is nothing to fear directly from foreign terrorists," Domingo added.

At the same time, Domingo said she has already alerted the National Intelligence Coordinating Agency (NICA) on reports that some 30 Filipino Muslims are training for a jihad, or holy war, in Pakistan.

She said authorities are monitoring the 30 Filipinos but stressed that they have not been tagged as suspected terrorists.

Domingo, however, refused to identity the 30 Filipinos, deferring to the government policy that only National Security Adviser Roilo Golez is authorized to reveal any information on counter-terrorism.

Meanwhile, Office of Muslim Affairs chief Datu Zamzamin Ampatuan warned the government on its approach in ferreting out sympathizers of suspected international terrorist Osama bin Laden, who is believed responsible for the US attacks.

"I’ve heard reports of some local Muslims with the mindset of extremists sympathetic to Bin Laden but the majority of Filipino Muslims are peace-loving. We should be careful not to alienate this majority," Ampatuan said.

The National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) is looking into reports that two local Muslims, identified as Abdul Asmad and Ustadz Hussein Manatad, were supposedly warning of a jihad against American facilities in Central Luzon.