Obama's top Asia diplomat says baffled by Duterte pronouncements
Source: Reuters
WORLD NEWS | Wed Oct 12, 2016 | 2:55pm EDT
Obama's top Asia diplomat says baffled by Duterte pronouncements
By David Brunnstrom | WASHINGTON
The top U.S. diplomat for East Asia said on Wednesday he did not know what a "panoply" of statements by Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte since taking office this year would mean for Manila's future security cooperation with Washington.
Duterte has made a series of conflicting statements about the future of his country's long-standing alliance with the United States. Last week he said U.S. President Barack Obama should "go to hell" and alluded to severing ties with Washington.On Wednesday, in an apparent break from a weeks-long torrent of anti-American rhetoric, Duterte said the Philippines would maintain its existing defense treaties and its military alliances.
But he added to the confusion when he said his foreign policy was to "realign" and reiterated that joint exercises with U.S. troops, a decades-old tradition, would be stopped.
Obama's senior U.S. diplomat for East Asia, Assistant Secretary of State Daniel Russel, told a roundtable discussion with Washington defense journalists he was baffled.
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http://www.reuters.com/article/us-philippines-duterte-usa-idUSKCN12C2DE