Two Iraqi diplomats expelled from Manila for espionage<\/p>\n
Agencies, Manila<\/p>\n
The Philippines on Monday ordered the expulsion of two high-
\nranking Iraqi Embassy staffers following a U.S. request for
\ncountries to expel Baghdad's diplomats.<\/p>\n
Foreign Secretary Blas Ople said he summoned Iraqi Charge
\nd'Affaires Samir Bolus to inform him that First Secretary Abdul
\nKarim Shwaikh and an attache, Karim Nassir Hamid, had to leave
\nthe country within 72 hours.<\/p>\n
President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo said the two will be
\nexpelled because of \"evidence of espionage.\" She said the Iraqi
\nEmbassy in Manila will not be closed and Iraqi diplomats will be
\ndealt with case by case.<\/p>\n
\"We are only expelling those with some evidence of espionage,\"
\nshe said.<\/p>\n
Ople said the two Iraqis were taking photographs of the
\nAmerican Cemetery in Manila on the eve of a memorial service last
\nNovember. The U.S. Embassy canceled the event at the last minute,
\nciting a terrorist threat.<\/p>\n
Ople said when the diplomats saw they were being followed by
\nPhilippine police, they changed taxis several times to escape
\nsurveillance.<\/p>\n
Last month, Philippine officials expelled an Iraqi consul,
\nHusham Husain, over suspicion of links with Filipino Muslim
\nextremists.<\/p>\n
Manila said Husain was ordered out after intelligence officers
\ntraced mobile phone calls from Abu Sayyaf rebels to the diplomat
\nimmediately after a blast in October killed a U.S. soldier and
\nthree Filipinos at a karaoke bar in Zamboanga City.<\/p>\n
The Iraqi embassy denied Husain was involved with Abu Sayyaf,
\na Philippine Muslim kidnap gang blacklisted by the United States
\nas a terrorist organization with links to Osama bin Laden's al-
\nQaeda network.<\/p>\n
The Bureau of Immigration said the 11 men were arrested last
\nweek on the main island of Luzon and on Mindanao, the scene of
\ndecades of violence by several rebel groups seeking an Islamic
\nhomeland in the south of the mainly Roman Catholic country.<\/p>\n
One of the Iraqis was implicated in the 1989 kidnapping of a
\nmember of the Kuwaiti royal family, it said.<\/p>\n
Senior police sources said the Saudi was a suspect in the 1991
\nbombing of a library in central Manila run by the U.S. embassy,
\nand was also being questioned about links to a suspected
\nIndonesian militant.<\/p>\n
The Philippines, one of Washington's staunchest Asian allies
\nin the global war on terrorism, has increasingly been sensitive
\nto possible security threats, especially after it joined last
\nweek the \"coalition of the willing\" backing Washington's military
\naction against Iraq.<\/p>\n
Arroyo defended the move as more lenient compared with other
\ncountries. She noted that Jordan, \"which is a neighbor of Iraq
\nand is supposed to be a friend of Iraq, already expelled its five
\ndiplomats, so we are in fact bending backward in a show of
\nfriendship to the people of Iraq.\"<\/p>\n
The Iraqi Embassy in Manila has seven accredited diplomats.
\nThe ambassador-designate, Ghazi Faissal Hussein, still hasn't
\npresented his credentials.<\/p>\n
Elsewhere in the region, Thailand has expelled three low-
\nranking Iraqi diplomats, while majority Muslim Malaysia and
\nIndonesia have said they will not comply with the U.S. request.<\/p>\n
Last week, Immigration Commissioner Andrea Domingo announced
\n11 Iraqis have been arrested in an anti-terrorist sweep and
\ndeportation proceedings were underway. Domingo said the Iraqis
\nhave been monitored for terrorist activities for some time and
\nclaimed they were part of an \"established network\" linked to
\nHusain, the expelled Iraqi consul.<\/p>",
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