DFA spokesman Assistant Secretary Raul Hernandez. INQUIRER.net FILE PHOTO
MANILA, Philippines – The Philippine Embassy team sent to Sabah has visited the Filipino refugees there and found that they have adequate food and medical assistance.
“[The team] saw that they are adequately assisted by the Non-Government Organizations in Malaysia,” Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) spokesman Raul Hernandez announced Tuesday citing reports coming from the Philippine Embassy in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
“They were able to look at and meet with the Filipinos there and they confirmed that [the refugees] have adequate food and that they are being extended medical assistance,” Hernandez said.
The estimated 500 evacuees had come from the surrounding villages and they had been asked to leave so as to avoid being caught by the conflict there, he said.
Many Filipinos have fled the surrounding areas of Lahad Datu in Sabah after hostilities broke out due to the entry into the island of an estimated 200 members of the Sultanate of Sulu who insisted that Sabah is their rightful territory.
Hundreds more Filipinos had returned to Tawi-Tawi in Mindanao aboard boats to escape the conflict.