Pinoy peacekeepers continue performing duties in Golan Heights

MANILA, Philippines - Filipino peacekeepers in the Golan Heights are still performing their duties under the mandate of the United Nations in the troubled region.

If not manning the UN post at Position 80, they are at Camp Ziouani, the UN Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF) military police base at the border of Israel and Syria.

“Our troops continue to perform their jobs under the command of Col. Ted Damusnog,” said Col. Roberto Ancan, commander of the Armed Forces of the Philippines-Peacekeeping Operations Center.

Sources said Filipino peacekeepers would no longer return to their old UN post at Positions 68 and 69, which the Al Nusra Front rebels surrounded and attacked last month.

The first group of Filipino peacekeepers at Position 69 escaped with the help of Irish troops. But those holed up at Position 68 engaged rebels in a three-day standoff that ended in seven hours of fighting before the troops staged their “greatest escape under the cover of darkness.”

The incident resulted in the resignation of the UNDOF Filipino chief Col. James Ezra Enriquez amid disagreements with Indian Force commander Lt. Gen. Iqbal Singh Singha over the handling of the crisis.

Singha, in a bid to secure the safe release of 45 Fijian peacekeepers taken by the rebels, had earlier ordered the Filipino troops to surrender their firearms to the rebels. The Filipinos refused.

The Fijians were released unharmed the other day by their al-Qaeda-linked Al Nusra Front captors in UN-sponsored negotiations.

Enriquez resigned after Singha labeled the Filipino peacekeepers as cowards and unprofessional for disobeying his order to surrender their firearms.

He returned to the country last Wednesday afternoon, leaving Filipino troops under Damusnog.

The UN peacekeeping mission known as UNDOF in the Golan Heights involves 1,223 troops from six countries – Fiji, India, Ireland, Nepal, the Netherlands and the Philippines.

But the worsening security situation in the area due to the ongoing rebellion in Syria has prompted the Philippines not to send another batch of peacekeepers to the region to replace those who are due to return to the country next month.