RP asks US: Redeploy troops for Luzon rescue

MANILA – The Philippine government has asked the United States to redeploy its troops to help in relief and rescue efforts in storm-hit areas in northern Luzon.

"The NDCC (National Disaster Coordinating Council) requested from the US embassy on the re-deployment of US military forces to Northern Luzon for humanitarian assistance and disaster response operations," the agency said in its report on Friday morning.

US Ambassador to the Philippines Kristie Kenney on Thursday said US troops helping the government in its relief efforts in Metro Manila and surrounding provinces, which were hit by floods caused by tropical storm Ondoy, were already wrapping up its humanitarian assistance efforts.

Kenney told ANC television on Thursday said that some of the US troops that would be pulling out starting Friday until Saturday will proceed to Fort Magsaysay in Nueva Ecija for joint exercises with the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP).

"The US military part is ending because the relief [in Metro Manila and surrounding provinces] is about over and the Armed Forces of the Philippines won’t need the extra help," the US ambassador said.

She said relief efforts being conducted by the US Agency for International Development (USAID) will continue.

Heavy rains, however, continued to fall over northern Luzon provinces until Friday, flooding several areas and displacing thousands in Pangasinan, Nueva Ecija, Pampanga, and Cagayan and nearby provinces.

More than 100 people are feared dead due to landslides that happened from Thursday night to early Friday morning in Benguet, Baguio City, and Mountain Province in the Cordillera region.

Local officials in the northern part of Luzon on Friday cried for help as the number of people affected by rains brought on by tropical depression Pepeng (international codename Parma) continued to rise.

High ranking officials of the military and government have arrived in the affected areas in Luzon, assuring aid to the displaced and trapped people in their flooded homes.

AFP chief of staff Gen. Victor Ibrado said the military has deployed at least a dozen rubber boats, 2 assault crafts, amphibian rescue trucks, and rescue helicopters to Pangasinan and other flooded provinces.

Ibrado said 4 Chinook helicopters and 18 rubber boats from the US armed forces were also being deployed to northern Luzon to help in the rescue efforts.

He said the rescue efforts will start in problematic areas in the eastern part of Pangasinan.

 

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