U.S. readies for Yemen President Saleh, refuses to divulge details
Washington, D.C., United States (AHN) – The United States on Monday confirmed issuance of visa to ailing Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh for a limited time to undergo medical treatment but refused to divulge time-period for which the visa is issued.
“We have issued a visa for Ali Abdullah Saleh,” said Victoria Nuland, the State Department spokesperson, adding, “It is strictly for medical treatment, and our expectation is that he will leave the United States when his medical treatment is complete.”
Asked to comment on the time period for which this visa is issued, Nuland said, “He’s got a visa for the period that he anticipated the medical treatment would last. If the treatment goes on longer and he needs to apply for an extension, he would do that with Homeland Security.”
Yemeni political players are expecting to utilize President Saleh’s absence to move the country “on a concrete transition plan to a more democratic Yemen,” said Nuland, adding, “We do believe that Saleh’s absence from Yemen at this critical juncture might, in fact, facilitate that dialogue and facilitate the transition process.”
Agreeing that, “it might be helpful to the transition process that he’s out of the country now,” Nuland reiterated, “It (the visa application) was not approved for political purposes. It was approved for medical treatment. The timing, we think, is fortuitous, however, and we hope that the Yemenis will use the time well.”
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Aquino Unlikely To Remove Beleaguered Undersecretary
New York, NY, United States (AHN) – The shoe is now on the other foot. The political opposition during the administration of former Philippine President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo often demanded the resignation of cabinet members tainted by accusations of scandal. When Arroyo did not remove the official, she was accused of coddling inept officials.
New President Benigno Aquino III is facing the same dilemma his predecessor had to deal with. Calls for the removal of beleaguered Interior Undersecretary Rico Puno are mounting. However, Aquino has indicated he would keep Puno in his post because the president trusts him.
Puno is at the eye of a public storm because of his alleged poor handling of the Hong Kong bus hostage crisis, which ended in the death of seven Hong Kong tourists. The probe body that investigated the hostage crisis recommended that Puno be charged, along with 12 other people.
This week, Puno was named twice as the recipient of lobby money from illegal gambling operators.
The first accuser was retired Dagupan Bishop Oscar Cruz, who named Puno on Tuesday – together with the former Philippine National Police Director General Jesus Verzosa, several governors, mayors and police officials – as coddlers of the illegal numbers game called jueteng.
On Wednesday, a Filipino senator on sick leave attended the session briefly to denounce the partnership between the Department of Interior and local government and PNP in protecting jueteng operators. Aside from Puno and Verzosa, Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago named Puno’s kin, Ronaldo Puno as also involved. Ronaldo Puno headed the Interior department during the Arroyo and Joseph Estrada presidencies.
Santiago named 17 other coddlers of jueteng, including Ilocos Norte Gov. Luis Singson and Rodolfo Pineda, the husband of Pampanga Governor Lilia Pineda, whom Cruz earlier identified as a protector of gambling activities.
Aquino, who is in New York, said he is hesitant to accept the resignation of the Interior undersecretary because he would like to give Puno due process. The president said he needs people in his administration whom he could trust, and stressed Puno was with him since their days in the opposition.
Puno, because of the double whammy, had offered to resign from his post because of perceptions that he has damaged the reputation of the Aquino administration, which trumpets clean and corrupt-free governance.
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