Obama visit to boost ‘enduring alliance’

INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

MANILA, Philippines—US President Barack Obama’s visit to the Philippines in April is expected to further boost the enduring treaty alliance between the two countries, one which currently stands as “our deepest bilateral engagement,” according to the country’s top diplomat.

Foreign Secretary Albert del Rosario said Obama’s first visit to Manila, after a postponement in October, would underscore the strong ties between the two allies—a relationship the Philippines has been counting on as it faces Chinese provocations in the disputed West Philippine Sea (South China Sea).

“President Barack Obama’s visit reaffirms the enduring treaty alliance and the strategic and economic partnership between the Philippines and the United States,” Del Rosario told the Inquirer via text.

“Our bilateral cooperation covers many key areas, including defense, trade, investment, tourism, development and humanitarian assistance and people-to-people ties, all of which reflect the fact that it is with the US that we maintain our deepest bilateral engagement,” said the foreign secretary, formerly the ambassador to Washington.

Obama is scheduled to visit Manila in the final leg of a four-nation swing through the Asia Pacific in April. Exact dates have yet to be set, but the White House said Obama’s stops will include Japan, South Korea and Malaysia.

His visit fulfills his promise to return to the region and push through with trips to Kuala Lumpur and Manila, which he was supposed to visit in October but had to postpone amid the partial US government shutdown. In Obama’s stead, Secretary of State John Kerry visited the region, including Manila, in December.

While in the Philippines, Obama will hold talks with President Aquino on the two countries’ wide-ranging relations, particularly in the areas of defense and economic ties.

“The meeting will be between the presidents of two democratic nations, representing peoples that share common values—democracy, freedom, liberty—and peoples who have a history of shared sacrifice for these values,” Del Rosario said on Friday.

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