Senator Dick Gordon said Hong Kong authorities acted with disrespect and exhibited lack of good judgment in the manner they have treated former Foreign Affairs Secretary Albert del Rosario, who was detained for hours at the Hong Kong airport for undisclosed reasons.
Gordon pointed out that with Del Rosario’s pronouncements, too, on the abandonment of our fishermen by Chinese crewmen, such action cannot be interpreted as no less than intimidation if not outright harassment of a law abiding and internationally respected personality as the former chief of the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA).
“Hong Kong authorities acted with disrespect and exhibited lack of good judgment. The maintenance of good and friendly relations, bilateral or multilateral, state to state, people to people, is a main objective of every government,” the seasoned legislator said.
“The maintenance of good and friendly relations is a main objective of every government.”
The veteran lawmaker pointed out that this is the second time in one month that a Filipino official had been detained for hours at the Hong Kong airport. Last May 21, former Ombudsman Conchita Carpio-Morales experienced the same ordeal when she and her family visited Hong Kong for vacation.
Although Morales was eventually allowed to enter Hong Kong, she decided not to push through with the trip.
Del Rosario and Morales earlier sued China President Xi Jinping before the International Criminal Court (ICC) for crimes against humanity over Beijing’s activities in the South China Sea.
“The Philippines and China are close neighbors.”
“The relevant ranking Chinese officials should take heed that we cannot change geography, that the Philippines and China are close neighbors. And have had a long history of friendly relations that should not be imperiled by mindless action such as in the Del Rosario and Carpio-Morales treatment by HK authorities and the West Philippine Sea,” the senator said.