Third opinion sought on autopsy of Filipina maid

Third opinion sought on autopsy of Filipina maid

MANILA (AFP): The Philippines said yesterday it will push for a third-party opinion on the cause of death of a Filipina maid whose 1991 murder is at the root of an ongoing diplomatic rift with Singapore.

Manila downgraded relations with Singapore following the hanging there last month of 42-year-old Filipina maid Flor Contemplacion for the murder of compatriot Delia Maga and her young Singapore charge, crimes which Philippine medical examiners later said she could not have committed.

But Singaporean and American examiners, who conducted a new autopsy Wednesday with Philippine experts, upheld Singapore's original findings.

Filipino forensics experts who exhumed the corpse for a second autopsy earlier this month stood by their contrary opinion.

Philippine Foreign Secretary Roberto Romulo, who will be leaving his post at the end of the month after taking responsibility for Manila's failure to save Contemplacion, told reporters he would be discussing with President Fidel Ramos the government's next move.

"The next step clearly is a neutral third party," he said, adding that he expected to discuss it with his Singapore counterpart.

There was no immediate reaction from Singapore, but Romulo said the two governments have agreed in principle to turn to third parties in case of a deadlock. Singapore has said it would reopen the case if the third-party experts agreed with Manila.

"We have to come to an agreement on the venue and as to who will constitute the third party," Romulo said, adding that "in principle" it would have to be done on neutral ground.

"The issue will be prolonged, but I don't think this will remain on a crisis level," said Julius Caesar Parrenas of the Institute for International and Strategic Studies (IISS), a Manila-based think tank which focuses on regional issues.

"The issue has been overtaken by newer headlines. It will slide down in the priority of public attention in the next few weeks -- whatever the outcome," he told AFP.

He said the two countries were "trying very hard to keep relations on an even keel throughout the crisis," and that both were hopeful that the issue would eventually "blow over."

A powerful public backlash in the Philippines, where Contemplacion is now elevated to martyr status, brought bilateral ties to an all-time low with Manila downgrading its embassy and Singapore being forced to recall its own ambassador at Ramos' request.

Aside from Romulo, the Philippine government also sacked and recalled diplomats for mishandling the case.

"There is no question that Flor Contemplacion could have done it," Michael Baden, director of the Forensic Sciences Unit of the New York State Police, said. He is one of three U.S. experts brought into the case by Singapore.

But Romulo said "it's clearly understood" that the Americans' opinion was made on the basis of their being Singapore advisers, and that they "would not be part of the neutral third party" experts.

At issue at Wednesday's autopsy were Manila's assertions that Maga's ribs were fractured prior to death, and that the skull and ribs showed evidence she had been bludgeoned immediately before her death.

Singaporean experts maintained that damage and evidence uncovered by Philippines experts were due to decomposition, or occurred after death, and they stood pat on the initial 1991 police autopsy that ruled Maga had been strangled.