RP security tight for Asia-Pacific meet
RP security tight for Asia-Pacific meet
By Uday Khandeparkar
SUBIC BAY, Philippines (Reuter): The Naval Magazine used to be impenetrable, with deep silos where ammunition was stored built in a heavily guarded clearing between a 12-hectare rain-forest and the deep waters of Triboa Bay.
Most of the silos have now been demolished to make way for 21 specially built villas, where leaders of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum will stay when they arrive in this freeport on Nov. 25 for their annual summit.
The villas, which cost $1 million each according to Subic officials, have been built there not just for views of lush forest and the blue-green waters of the bay, but because of its fortified location.
Two or three of the leaders may stay in the villas overnight on Nov. 25, APEC organizers say, but most will spend just a few hours there -- safe behind one-foot thick concrete walls and windows with bulletproof glass.
The security of the 16 visiting leaders, who will include U.S. President Bill Clinton, is the overriding concern for the Philippines as summit hosts.
"This was the most secure area when the Americans were here," said Ferdinand Roaquin, a public relations officer of the Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority, which runs the freeport.
The freeport was set up in 1992 on the site of what used to be the biggest U.S. naval base outside the United States.
For nearly 50 years after the end of World War II, Subic's deep natural harbor helped the U.S. Navy project its power throughout the Pacific and to the Asian mainland itself.
Subic was an important asset during the Vietnam War both because of its port, its rest and recreation facilities and its Cubi Point naval air station, now a flourishing airport.
The Americans left after the Philippine Senate refused to renew the lease.
In the next few weeks many Americans will return, though this time as guests.
"This place will be crawling with Secret Service agents," said Roaquin as a party of journalists viewed the villas from a moving bus.
The bus was escorted by the Philippines' elite Presidential Security Group and was not allowed to stop. Pictures were forbidden.
The Philippine police and military are mobilizing thousands of men and women to provide security at Subic and in Manila, where the leaders will gather on Nov. 24 at the end of an APEC foreign ministers' meeting.
Tales of how well the villas will be protected abound.
"This was the most restricted place earlier. It had double fencing and people say one of them was electrified. I don't know if it may be reactivated during APEC," one resident, speaking anonymously.
Scheduled to arrive in Subic early on Nov. 25, the leaders will be taken straight from the airport to their villas, a five- minute drive away.
They will then gather for a formal welcome from President Fidel Ramos at the Leaders' Hall in the extensively renovated former Cubi Point Officers Club.
The renovations have left intact the nose of a Dakota transport aircraft built into the wall of what used to be a disco frequented by U.S. military personnel.