|
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/19/AR2009091901864.html?wprss=rss_nation
Diplomatic Immunity Leaves
Abused Workers in Shadows
By Sarah Fitzpatrick
Special to The Washington Post
Sunday, September 20, 2009
When Lauro L. Baja Jr. returned to his native Philippines in 2007, he had just finished a four-year
stint as ambassador to the United Nations that included two terms as president of the Security Council. A storied diplomatic
career that began in 1967 culminated with the Philippine president conferring upon him the highest award for foreign service.
Then a three-month episode from his U.N. days returned to haunt him. He was sued by Marichu Suarez Baoanan, who had worked
as a maid in New York City for Baja and his wife, Norma Castro
Baja. Baoanan, 40, said the Bajas brought her to the United States
in 2006 promising to find her work as a nurse. Instead, Baoanan said, she was forced to endure 126-hour workweeks with no
pay, performing household chores and caring for the couple's grandchild. Baja denied the charges, saying Baoanan was compensated.
He also invoked diplomatic immunity -- a right that usually halts such cases in their tracks. But in June, a federal judge
in Manhattan ruled that the former U.N. ambassador could not
claim immunity because Baoanan's "duties benefited the Baja family's personal household needs, and are unrelated to Baja's
diplomatic functions." Baoanan's attorney, Ivy Suriyopas, called the ruling "an important shift" in cases involving diplomatic
immunity. "Only one other case involving diplomatic immunity and domestic workers was able to progress this far," Suriyopas
said. Baja's attorney, Salvador E. Tuy, called the charges "untrue." The trial is ongoing.
The case highlights what advocates call a longtime pattern
of trafficking and exploitation of domestic workers by foreign diplomats in the United
States. "Unfortunately, cases involving diplomatic employers represent a disproportionate
amount of the domestic-worker abuse cases we see," said Suzanne Tomatore, director of the Immigrant Women and Children Project
at the New York City Bar
Justice Center. A July 2008
Government Accountability Office report identified 42 cases of abuse by diplomats over an eight-year period but emphasized
that the actual number was probably higher. "Nobody expected a number this big," said Thomas Melito, GAO director of the section
on international affairs and trade. Under the Vienna Conventions, diplomatic immunity provides a shield from prosecution that
is "almost absolute," said George Washington
University law professor Sean Murphy, who spent 11 years in the State
Department's Office of the Legal Adviser. Workers have historically had little success with complaints of abuse against diplomats.
For example, Mildrate Yancho Nchang said she toiled for three years without pay or a day off and then was hospitalized after
being beaten by a Cameroonian diplomat's wife. She sued in federal court in Maryland,
but the case was dismissed in 2006 when the diplomat asserted immunity. Advocates and lawyers say that the U.S. government does little to protect workers or hold foreign diplomats accountable.
Local law enforcement is often the first to learn of allegations. However, with a diplomat involved, local authorities must
wait for guidance from the Justice Department. "Federal law enforcement doesn't have the capacity to take on every abuse allegation,
and local law enforcement isn't always equipped to do so. Victims of abuse and trafficking find themselves in the gap between,"
Tomatore said. Justice Department officials must confer with the State Department, the gatekeeper for all complaints against
diplomats. As State Department officials weigh the implications of criminal or civil proceedings, a case can take months to
resolve, the GAO said. Justice Department spokesman Alejandro Miyar said the GAO may have overstated the delays. Although
Justice declined to say how many probes it had undertaken, the GAO report cited 19 trafficking investigations involving foreign
diplomats from 2005 to 2008. No case brought an indictment. State Department officials say they must balance protocol and
worker protections. Recently, a draft copy of State's 2008 report on human trafficking cited high-profile cases involving
diplomats from Kuwait and Tanzania.
The reference to the two countries was cut from the final report, according to sources with knowledge of the draft report
who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak on the record. Luis CdeBaca, the ambassador
at large on trafficking issues, said that his office takes abuse reports seriously but that the issue presents unique challenges.
"Immunity should not mean impunity to enslave domestic servants on U.S.
soil, and we will continue to work to ensure that these domestic workers are accorded full rights and human dignity in our
country," CdeBaca said. But State has yet to deny or revoke a diplomatic visa or implement sanctions as a result of an abuse
allegation. There are signs of progress. In February 2008, State sent pamphlets to all overseas posts to inform incoming A-3/G-5
visa holders of their rights. Consular officials must verify that each applicant has understood the information. The pamphlet
is available only in English. In December, Congress reauthorized the Trafficking Victims Protection Act, with safeguards for
visa holders. The law now requires State to assume greater oversight of complaints and cooperate more closely with Justice.
But the State Department has been slow to implement the policy changes required under the law.
~~~~~~~~~~~
Malou Mariano, elected to the Sister Cities International Board of Directors
Friday, September 18, 2009 9:41 PM
From:
"maria.embry@sbcglobal.net" <maria.embry@sbcglobal.net>
To all Friends,
Proud to announce the recent election
in Belfast Northern Ireland of our very own Pinay, Ms. Malou Mariano
to the prestigious position in the Sister Cities International Board of Directors
Sincerely,
Maria Elizabeth
Source:
Press Releases
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
September 14, 2009
MEDIA CONTACT:
Frances Reimers
freimers@sister-cities.org
202-347-8630 x8251
Sister Cities International Announces
Election of Board of Directors and New
Officers
WASHINGTON, DC —
Sister Cities International announced the results of the 2009 Board of Directors
elections at its annual Member Business Meeting on August 1. The Member Business
Meeting was part of the Sister Cities International 2009 Annual Conference
in Belfast, Northern Ireland,
July 29-August 1, 2009.
Newly elected Directors include:
- Lalit Acharya, City of Riverside , Riverside , CA
- Sarah Beverly Larkin, Collective Media, Frisco , TX
- Thomas Lisk, LeClairRyan, Richmond
, VA
- Carol Robertson Lopez, New
Mexico Children's Foundation, Albuquerque , NM
- Malou
Mariano, Carson
Sister Cities Association, Long Beach , CA
The Sister Cities International Board of Directors also elected new
officers for 2009-2010. The leadership of the board is:
- Chairman: Michael Hyatt,
UBS Financial Services, Inc., Ft. Worth , TX
- Vice Chair/Chair-Elect: Brad Cole, The City of Carbondale
, Carbondale , IL
- Secretary: James Hromas, Oklahoma
State University , Stillwater , OK
- Treasurer: Fred Blanton, The Boeing
Company, Alexandria , VA
- At Large: Enda Brennan, Santa
Cruz Sister Cities Committee, Santa Cruz , CA
- At Large: Mimi Barker, Standard
& Poor's, New York , NY
- At Large: Mark Walton,
The Africa Channel, New York , NY
MEDIA CONTACT: Frances Reimers, 202.347.8630
x8251 or freimers@sister-cities.org
Sister
Cities International promotes peace through mutual respect, understanding and cooperation by focusing exchanges and public
programs on sustainable and economic development, youth and education, arts and culture, and humanitarian assistance. More
information about Sister Cities International can be found at www.sister-cities.org. |
http://www.sunstar.com.ph/baguio/guam-military-project-needs-pinoy-workers
Guam military project needs Pinoy workers
Saturday, September 5,
2009
By Ramon Dacawi
FIFTEEN thousand skilled Filipino workers, among them from Baguio , will be recruited
to help build a unified United States military installation in Guam starting next year.
Three mayors and another executive from Guam, who were here for Baguio’s centennial anniversary and the
Sister-Cities Summit, announced the news during a business encounter Tuesday afternoon with the local chamber
of commerce headed by Johnny dela Cruz at the Baguio Country Club.
Mayor Frank Blas of Tamuning-Tumon-Harmon, with which Baguio forged ties, said
the Filipino workers’ experience and skill in construction work, aside from their facility with the English language, weighed heavily on the choice of the Philippines as recruitment base.
The military facility project will be developed in time for the a transfer of US Marines based in Okinawa, according to Angel Sablan, executive director of the Guam Mayors Council.
He added that the US is also looking at Asia for the supplies
needed for the project, saying the plan is to ship these to Saipan for stocking.
This also means, he said, the construction of schools, medical and other facilities for the families of soldiers
who will be assigned to the base.
Mayor Vicente Gumataotao of Piti said the project costing US$15 billion will house servicemen under the US Marines, Air Force and Navy.
The Guam executives, including Hagatna ( Agana ) Mayor John Cruz, announced that
employment will be done through accredited recruitment agencies in the Philippines
.
City councilor Betty Lourdes Tabanda, co-chairperson of the Baguio ’s sister-city
committee, said the recruitment program was initially announced earlier this year when she and other city officials visited
Guam for a meeting on the sister-city program.
“This good news is one of the benefits that come with our forging ties with other local government units in our country and abroad,” she said.
Published in the Sun.Star Baguio newspaper on
September 6, 2009.
~~~~~~~~~~~
10 OFWs in Afghan
crash identified
INQUIRER.net
First Posted 13:01:00 07/21/2009
MANILA, Philippines--(UPDATE) The Department of Foreign
Affairs (DFA) has confirmed the identities of the ten Filipino workers killed in the helicopter crash in Kandahar on July 19.
The employer of the Filipino
workers, United States-based construction firm The AIM Group
Inc., furnished the names to the DFA after their families have been informed of the incident.
The Filipinos on board the aircraft which malfunctioned during takeoff and plunged to the ground were:
Celso
Q. Caralde (born in Gingoog
City, Misamis Oriental)
Ely I. Cariño (Cabusao, Camarines Sur)
Ernesto
C. De Vega (Naic, Cavite)
Manolito
C. Hornilla (Taysan, Batangas)
Leopoldo
G. Jimenez, Jr. (Lubao, Pampanga)
Mark
Joseph C. Mariano (Floridablanca, Pampanga)
Marvin
P. Najera (San Fernando,
Pampanga)
Rene
D. Taboclaon (Cagayan de Oro City)
Recardo
E. Vallejos (Bislig, Surigao del Sur)
Noli
M. Visda (Lubao, Pampanga)
The helicopter was reported to be carrying three crew members and 17 passengers of varying nationalities.
Sixteen of the passengers, including the Filipinos, were killed in the crash.
The company
said the next of kin for each Filipino employee have been notified of the death of their family member. After positive identification
is made of the bodies in Kandahar, these will be sent to Kuwait
and then repatriated to the Philippines.
The DFA has dispatched a team from the Philippine embassy in Islamabad to coordinate with local authorities for the repatriation.
“We have several representatives in the Philippines
who will ensure that the bodies are repatriated to the families,” an official from AIM said.
“Each Filipino employee and his dependent family members will be eligible
for payments under Defense Base Act Insurance and other policies that are in place,” the company said. It added that it will process the insurance
claims as soon as possible and submit these to the insurance company.
Meanwhile, the company official clarified that all 10 Filipino workers
were already in Afghanistan when they
started working for AIM.
DFA Undersecretary for Migrant Workers’ Affairs Esteban
Conejos Jr. said the focus of the Philippine government is to attend to immediate concerns which include the repatriation
of the bodies and assistance that will be extended to the families.
“Our priority
now is to work closely with the employer and the relevant authorities to identify the remains and cause their repatriation
and ensure that all benefits due the workers are paid to their families. Thereafter, DFA will work with DoLE (Department of
Labor and Employment) and POEA (Philippine Overseas Employment Administration) to find out how these workers ended up working
in Afghanistan notwithstanding the deployment ban,” Conejos said in the DFA statement.
Additional Notes by M.E. Embry:
Source: http://www.dol.gov/esa/owcp/dlhwc/lsdba.htm
The Defense Base Act provides workers' compensation protection to
civilian employees working outside the United States on US military bases or under
a contract with the U.S. government for
public works or for national defense
~~~~~~~~~~~
http://www.propublica.org/feature/in-one-filipino-town-workers-injured-in-iraq-depend-on-aig-619
In
One
Filipino Town, Workers Injured in Iraq Depend on the Kindness of AIG
by T. Christian Miller, ProPublica - June 19, 2009 7:00 pm EDT
Jose Maque, 41 and his wife Rogelia Maque, 35, lean forward as they are interviewed. Maque was
working in Iraq as a contractor driving
a bus when he was injured by a mortar in 2006. At first he was offered $750 for his injures. He later settled for $1,000.
(Francine Orr/ Los Angeles Times)LUTOPAN, Philippines — To see the disparities in the U.S. system for taking care of civilian workers wounded in war zones, you need
go no further than this old mining town spilling down an island hillside.
Lutopan has sent an untold number of its sons
and daughters to work in Iraq, part of the invisible army that daily cares
and feeds U.S. soldiers.
One man has been killed. Another two crippled.
Under U.S. law, all are eligible for a
federally mandated workers compensation program for overseas contractors. But their treatment was far from uniform.
One of the injured received a large pay out. Another
was given far less after an insurance adjuster pressured him. And the parents of the man who died received 30 percent less
than they were due in benefits.
"Help my family. Help my family," said Maria Borgonia, whose son, Cirilo,
was killed in a mortar attack in Baghdad
in July 2007. "We are poor people."
The Labor Department, which oversees the program,
acknowledged that it had limited resources to handle claims from foreign workers. As a result, the settling of claims was
largely "driven" by the insurance industry, the agency said.
"Is it fair? ... Fair is a tough word to apply
to a worker's comp system," said Shelby Hallmark, the director of the program. "Would we like (insurance carriers) to be more
generous, and say, 'We're going to go ahead and pay because it's probably the case?' Yeah, probably. But they're within their
rights."
American International Group, or AIG, which handled the claims of all three workers in Lutopan,
declined to comment on individual cases, citing privacy concerns. The company said that it treated all foreign claimants equitably.
"We take numerous extraordinary measures under
very difficult circumstances to locate and pay claimants or their beneficiaries," AIG said in a statement.
Prime Projects International, which hired all three men, did not respond to requests for comment.
The wars in Iraq
and Afghanistan were a boon for jobless
workers in Lutopan, a former copper mining town. KBR, the defense contractor based in Houston,
used subcontractors who hired thousands of workers from the Philippines
to clean toilets and make meals for soldiers.
In 2006, Dubai-based Prime Projects International,
a KBR subcontractor, hired three men from Lutopan: Jose Maque, 41, Federico Ebarsabal, 61, and Cirilo Borgonia Jr., 33.
Each signed up for manual labor that paid $7,800
a year under a contract that required work seven days per week, 12 hours per day, according to copies of the work contracts
obtained by the Los Angeles Times. The men were making about $2 an hour.
Under a 1940s era law called the Defense Base
Act [1], the men were also covered by workers' compensation insurance. The insurance provides medical care or death benefits
to anyone injured or killed while working overseas on a federal contract.
The youngest of five, Cirilo "Jun Jun" Borgonia
started working for Dubai-based company in June 2006, driving shuttle buses around the Green Zone in Baghdad.
Although dangerous, Borgonia enjoyed his work.
He was given an award by KBR in "recognition for ... outstanding service." He told his family he wanted to become a U.S. soldier.
"I'm not afraid. I like this job. If I get lucky,
I'll come back on the plane. If I don't, I'll come back in a box," Borgonia told his sister once.
On July 10, 2007, Borgonia was driving near the
famed Assassin's Gate when a mortar hit. Borgonia and a soldier, Army Capt. Maria I. Ortiz, 40, were killed.
Borgonia bled to death, according to his death
certificate. A coworker provided the family with photos of the aftermath: a tight spray of shrapnel against a concrete barrier,
a pool of blood running toward a gutter, dried in the sun.
Borgonia's sister, Christina, worked in a Filipino
call center. Fluent in English and accustomed to making up to 300 calls per day, Christina used her free time to pester Prime
Projects, AIG, the company's workers' compensation insurer and the Labor Department.
The Borgonias, who were dependent on their son
for income, were entitled to a maximum of $100 a week in benefits under the Defense Base Act — a pittance by American
standards, but a substantial sum in the Philippines,
where per capita income is about $3,500 per year.
AIG was responsible for paying the benefit. Although
the law calls for payments to begin within 14 days of an incident, AIG paid nothing until January 2008, six months later.
Then, an AIG adjuster explained in a letter that
the couple would receive $78 a week in death benefits. There was no explanation of why the company reduced the Borgonias'
benefit by $22 a week. On a Labor Department form accompanying the letter, AIG simply checked a box "No" to indicate that
it was not paying the maximum rate.
Now in their 60s, the couple live in a bare concrete
house that slopes down the hill leading to the old copper mine. Inside, a table is ringed with old photos of their son. There
is a fluorescent light, a fan, louvered windows and a simple linoleum floor.
Both deeply religious Catholics, the couple rise
daily before sunrise for a black rosary service, a Filipino tradition. They walk through town, candles in hand, remembering
their dead son as they make their way to the town's small yellow church.
Under the law, the Borgonias could have fought
for higher benefits. But the Borgonias said the offer from AIG seemed good enough. Their concern was not about the money,
but their son.
"When my son died, I'm no long willing" to live,
Cirilo Borgonia, 67, said in broken English. "We died with him."
Jose Maque was working in Iraq as a contractor driving a bus when he was injured in
2006. (Francine Orr/ Los Angeles Times)The carriers' dealings
with the wounded is also largely unregulated — and in some ways, more brusque, according to former workers.
Jose Maque was injured in the Green Zone in November
2006 when a mortar round slammed nearby. Red hot shrapnel ripped through his shoulder, neck and back.
Maque was treated at a military hospital and shipped
to the Philippines for recovery. He returned
to Iraq a month later — he needed
the money for his wife and six children — but left for good several months later. The aches in his body, he said, made
work impossible.
Maque said it took him three months to fully recover
from his injury. Under the law, he could have been paid as much as $1,200 for lost time. He was also eligible to receive medical
treatment for any future complications from his injuries.
AIG paid him nothing until June 2007, some nine
months after his injury. A local insurance adjuster representing AIG showed up at his door and made Maque a settlement offer.
The adjuster bartered over Maque's shrapnel wounds
with techniques familiar to a used car lot. First he offered $750, which Maque refused. The adjuster said he'd ask his superiors
for more, Maque said. When he returned, the adjuster offered $1000 — $500 for his lost time and $500 for any future
medical treatments.
The adjuster said, "Take it, or you won't get
anything at all," said Maque, who bears a long scar running across his neck and a growth on his right shoulder where shrapnel
entered. "So instead of nothing, we got something."
During an interview, Maque, a high school graduate,
appeared able to speak limited English. He was unable to explain terms in the settlement, written in English, such as "Claimant
says he is not under duress." Maque had no attorney during the negotiation and said he did not understand the settlement.
"The lawyer said, 'Do you understand what you're
signing?' We didn't, but we said yes," Maque said. "I was worried that if I made trouble, I wouldn't get anything ... I only
signed because I needed the money."
Federico
Ebarsabal was injured a few months before Maque in a routine workplace accident — also covered by federal workers
compensation.
He was doing carpentry work on a fire station
at Camp Victory, a sprawling U.S. base south of Baghdad,
when he fell off a scaffold in September 2006 and broke his hip.
Ebarsabal was taken to a clinic run by KBR, the
largest contractor in Iraq. There, KBR
officials told him to return to work. Ebarsabal, however, insisted on further medical care, saying he had continued trouble
with his leg.
Six weeks later, he was taken to a hospital in
Dubai. There, x-rays revealed that KBR has tried to send him
back to work while suffering a complete fracture of his hip bone. Ebarsabal had a hip replacement, and returned to the Philippines for recovery.
"We were like prisoners. We'd work for 12 hours
a day, no days off," Ebarsabal said. "We were stuck."
Ebarsabal had worked overseas for foreign companies,
and understood the concept of workers' compensation. He also spoke enough English to fill out a claim form, which he did in
April 2007.
Months later, the Labor Department sent his form
back in the mail with a blue sticky note attached. In English, the note said: "We have no record of this claim. Please resubmit."
Undeterred, Ebarsabal began regular correspondence
with the Labor Department, sending letters in fractured English by overseas mail. In September 2007, he noted that he had
received nothing: "I hope that before Christmas it will come," he wrote.
Finally, in late November, an attorney representing
AIG and Prime Projects, presented Ebarsabal with a settlement for $8,000 — more than eight times that received by Maque.
The amount included $6,000 for lost time — roughly equal to the compensation he was due under the law — and $2,000
for future medical care.
Neither AIG, Ebarsabal's insurance company, nor
Prime Projects, his employer, would be on the hook for past or future medical care or lost wage compensation, the settlement
said.
Ebarsabal said he felt lucky to receive what he
got.
"I don't know how to explain it. I really don't
know how it happened," he said. "God has been very merciful and generous. I was finding my way in darkness and it finally
worked
~~~~~~~~~~~
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
03-31-09 0350ET
Copyright (c) 2009 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
Filipino Worker Killed In Afghan Attack - Government
MANILA (AFP)--A Filipino worker was killed earlier this month in a rocket attack on the main military base in southern
Afghanistan, the Philippines foreign ministry said Tuesday.
The victim, a carpenter working for a United Arab Emirates-based construction firm, was killed March 20, Foreign Undersecretary
Esteban Conejos told reporters.
"He was killed by a mortar attack inside the camp," Conejos said.
The dead man was identified
as Norbert Hobayan. Another Filipino, Rolando Tricenio, was wounded in the attack and is recovering at a hospital on the base,
he said.
The NATO-led International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan had announced that a contract worker was killed and
six wounded in the attack, but didn't release their nationalities.
The Philippines advises its nationals not to go to Afghanistan.
"Conditions in that area are quite unstable. We urge the public to take the advice of the government that it is dangerous
to travel to Afghanistan," Conejos said
~~~~~~~~~~~
http://thepinoy.net/?p=1345
Shadowy trails:
Stories of the undocumented
Posted July 2nd, 2008 | Immigration | Comments (1) | 1,877
views
By CHER
S. JIMENEZ – abs-cbn news online
Excerpt:
……..Iraq,
however, was not named as a trafficking area, although nearly half of the more than 7,000 Filipinos there are undocumented.
Critics say the Philippine government, which is supportive of the US war
in Iraq, is not seriously committed to stopping the hiring of OFWs by American
facilities in Baghdad. This support was also demonstrated
in 2002 when about 300 Filipino construction workers were immediately
whisked to Guantánamo, Cuba,
to build detention cells for captured Taliban fighters.
Network of leeches
Filipinos working at Camp Anaconda
in Iraq had defied a deployment ban and
now face security risks. In May 2007 the Department of Foreign Affairs renewed its call for OFWs in Iraq to seek the help of the nearest Philippine labor office if they needed assistance
to come home. The department promised they would not be prosecuted and “everything is forgiven.” The advice came
following the death of a Filipino worker in a rocket attack in Baghdad’s
US-controlled Green Zone.
Thirteen Filipinos have been killed
in Iraq since 2004, according to
the Iraq Coalition Casualty Count, a Web-based service that monitors war-related deaths. But despite the three-year-old deployment
ban, Filipinos continue to pour into Iraq, using Dubai as a transit point.
A licensed recruitment firm hired Andres Jose (not his real name) to work as a warehouseman
for the Dubai-based Prime Projects International, a subcontractor of US military contractor Halliburton.
“The recruitment agency in the Philippines
arranged my visa for Dubai. From there, I was able to get
through Iraq,” confesses Jose. He
adds that while he wants to, he cannot go back home for a vacation because he had violated the deployment ban.
“Because of that stupid ban, I couldn’t come home and see my family.
Our employer is also using this ban as an excuse not to pay for our visa and a return ticket
to Dubai if we wish to come back to Iraq,”
he fumes.
Others, such as Peter Noble and Jun Santillan, who also work in a US-run facility in Iraq, chose to pay their way to get a reprieve from the 12-hour
daily work schedule they endured for years without seeing their families. They felt that the occasional telephone calls and
chats on the Internet were not enough to relieve their stress and homesickness. They are also prevented from leaving the camp
because of security threats.
Santillan shelled out P75,000 to return to Iraq
after a brief vacation in the Philippines.
Someone working at the Philippine foreign affairs department asked him to pay P13,000 so that the “not valid for travel
to Iraq” would not be stamped on
his passport. In Dubai, a Filipina known only as “Mommy” arranged for his visa
and plane ticket to the UAE and his transit flight to Iraq.
“Mommy’s” contact in the Philippines
escorted Santillan through the airport immigration check.
From cunning agents who victimize rural prospects to shady immigration officers at the Ninoy Aquino International
Airport in Manila,
the network of leeches that bleed OFW victims dry is extensive.
Philippine officials are well aware of this “guided” departure of unauthorized
Filipino immigrants, but have not launched a serious effort to stop it. The anti-illegal recruitment task force previously
formed by President Arroyo did little to prosecute those responsible for these unlawful acts. The task force died a natural
death as its head, a former police officer, was recently convicted of killing fellow law officers in a drug operation.
~~~~~~~~~~~
http://www.gmanews.tv/story/41521/Family-claims-remains-of-Filipino-killed-in-Iraq
Excerpt:
Niceforo Idulsa, 38, an overseas Filipino worker was killed in a rocket attack in Baghdad’s heavily fortified
Green Zone on May 2 2007, …employed w/ the maintenance crew for Taylor Company, an American contractor in Baghdad. Idulsa is a native of Bilar, Bohol …When Idulsa left
the country last year, a ban on the deployment to Iraq was already in effect….The Philippine government enforced the
ban in 2004 following the abduction of a truck driver from Pampanga….Filipino workers currently in Iraq said there are
about 20,000 Filipinos there, mostly working in US-controlled military camps.
~~~~~~~~~~~
Source:
http://icasualties.org/Iraq/Contractors.aspx
Date Name Nationality Circumstances Where Occupation Employer
13-Aug-2006 Rogelio Saraida Filipino IED - roadside bomb Unknown Security Specialist AIM Group
18-Nov-2005 Ilocto, Alexander Mesa Filipino road accident between Iraq
and Kuwait Unknown Unknown
11-Nov-2005 Loque, Ponciano Filipino Car Bomb Baghdad (eastern) Unknown Unknown
11-Nov-2005 Carreon, Benjie Filipino Car Bomb Baghdad (eastern) Unknown Unknown
25-Aug-2005 Federico Samson Filipino IED Kirkuk engineer Lucent
Technologies Inc
18-Apr-2005 Torres, Rey Filipino Shooting incident Baghdad
Driver and security guard Qatar International Trading Company
14-Jun-2004 Flores, Raul Filipino Car Bomb Baghdad (Al Tahriri Square) power industry engineer Granite Services, Inc. (subsidiary of General Electric)
11-May-2004 Natividad, Raymundo Filipino Mortar attack (Iraqi) Camp Anaconda (near Balad) Warehouseman Prime
Projects International (Dubai)
28-Apr-2004 Reyes, Rodrigo Filipino Convoy attack Abdali (near Kuwait
border) Truckdriver Kellogg, Brown & Root
~~~~~~~~~~~
|
