Ramos begins five-nation trip

Ramos begins five-nation trip

MANILA (Reuter): Philippine President Fidel Ramos flew to India yesterday at the start of a five-nation tour of south Asia and the Middle East to look for fresh markets and investments.

Ramos, with a large business delegation, will spend three days in India before going to Bangladesh (March 5-7), Pakistan (March 7-9), Qatar (March 9-10) and Bahrain (March 10-11).

One of the officials accompanying him is former Moslem rebel chief Nur Misuari, who signed a peace deal with the government last September and is now governor of a semi-autonmous Moslem region in the southern Philippines.

Ramos and Misuari are engaged in a campaign to attract foreign investors to develop the impoverished Moslem area and contain an insurgency still being waged by two breakaway Moslem groups demanding an Islamic state.