Noy’s Nobel alibi hit as surrender to China
12/13/2010President Aquino in giving an obvious face-saving alibi that the country skipped the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony to encourage China to spare the lives of five Filipinos on death row charged for drug trafficking was widely criticized yesterday as a surrender to China.
Aquino gave a newspaper an exclusive inter-view the other day in his bid to rationalize a decision to stay away from the ceremony to honor jailed Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo, saying the move was “in our national in-terest” as human rights groups worldwide assailed the move as bowing to Chinese pressure.
Initially, Malacañang tried to deflect the criticisms, saying that a represent-ative assigned to represent the country in the event had a “conflict of schedule.”
“Our interest is to advance our citizens’ needs first,” the paper quoted the President as saying.
Aquino said he had written to Beijing seeking clemency for five Filipinos sentenced to death for drug trafficking..... MORE
Source: The Daily Tribune
URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/headlines/20101213hed4.html
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