DFA welcomes Kuwait’s bid to ease tension

BREAK FROM TENSION Foreign Secretary Alan Peter Cayetano takes a break from diplomatic tensions as he takes a selfie with other officials in Intramuros last March. —GRIGC.MONTEGRANDE

The Philippine Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) on Tuesday welcomed an olive branch from Kuwait in a migrant labor row, days after President Rodrigo Duterte announced a permanent ban on Filipino workers going to the Gulf state.

The dispute, simmering for months, erupted last week when Kuwait expelled the Philippine ambassador over videos of embassy staff helping Filipino workers flee allegedly abusive bosses in Kuwait.

But Kuwait sought to calm the crisis after the President said on Sunday that he was making permanent the ban on deployment which he had issued in February when a murdered Filipina maid was found in her bosses’ freezer.

Kuwaiti Deputy Foreign Minister Nasser al-Subaih said on Monday the row was “largely a misunderstanding.”

Moving forward

Foreign Secretary Alan Peter Cayetano welcomed that conciliatory message on Tuesday.

“This gesture will allow us to move forward,” Cayetano said in a statement.

But Cayetano did not address a part of the statement made by another Kuwaiti Deputy Foreign Minister, Khaled Al-Jarallah, that reiterated Kuwait’s original position to go after Philippine Embassy personnel who allegedly violated Kuwaiti sovereignty and diplomatic protocol to help Filipino maids flee their employers.

Some 262,000 Filipinos work in Kuwait, nearly 60 percent of them domestic workers, according to the DFA.

Al-Jarallah had said Kuwait was ready to cooperate with the Philippines to address issues facing Filipino workers, but would also “act decisively” against attempts to breach its sovereignty.

Cayetano also denied he and Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III had a shouting match over relations with Kuwait.

“It can’t be because Secretary Bello does not know how to shout,” Cayetano said. —Reports from DJ Yap, Dona Z. Pazzibugan, Julie M. Aurelio and AFP