PHILIPPINE PRESIDENT Rodrigo R. Duterte is taking seriously the US Intelligence Community’s report tagging the firebrand leader a threat to democracy in Southeast Asia, his spokesman said on Wednesday.

The Feb. 13 report, titled “Worldwide Threat Assessment of the US Intelligence Community,” is bylined by Daniel R. Coats, who, as Director of National Intelligence, heads this community.

The report places Mr. Duterte alongside Cambodian’s Hun Sen, the Rohingya crisis in Myanmar, and Thailand’s military-backed constitution as regional threats to democracy.

It also noted that countries in Southeast Asia “will struggle to preserve foreign policy autonomy in the face of Chinese economic and diplomatic coercion.”

VIEWED WITH ‘SOME CONCERN’
Mr. Duterte’s spokesman, Herminio Harry L. Roque, Jr., rejected the US Intelligence’s assessment of the Philippine leader as “myopic and speculative at best.”

Nevertheless, “(w)e view this declaration from no less than the intelligence department of the United States with some concern…,” Mr. Roque told DZMM radio.

The report said in part, “Democracy and human rights in many Southeast Asian countries will remain fragile in 2018 as autocratic tendencies deepen in some regimes and rampant corruption and cronyism undermine democratic values.”

“In the Philippines, President Duterte will continue to wage his signature campaign against drugs, corruption, and crime,” the report read further, adding that Mr. Duterte has suggested he could suspend the Constitution and declare a revolutionary government.

A leading critic of Mr. Duterte, opposition Senator Leila M. de Lima, had earlier warned that, under a revolutionary government, the military can oust its own commander-in-chief.

Mr. Roque for his part said Mr. Duterte “is no autocrat or has autocratic tendencies. He adheres to the rule of law and remains loyal to the Constitution. An autocracy is not prevalent, as they would like everyone to believe. Our media are still able to broadcast and print what they want — ‘fake news’ included. Our judiciary and the courts are functioning as usual. Our legislature remains independent and basic services are still being delivered.”

“I do not think that’s true. He is a lawyer, he knows the law, he wants to uphold the rule of law, he knows about the Bill of Rights,” the spokesman said.

This is not the first time the United States has criticized Mr. Duterte, who is notorious for his defiance of international pressure.

More than 4,000 people have been killed in what police call legitimate operations against suspected drug dealers and users under Mr. Duterte’s signature war on drugs since July 2016. International Criminal Court prosecutors have opened a preliminary examination into his anti-drugs campaign.

MANIPULATION OF SOCIAL MEDIA
The report also pointed out that “(d)omestic and foreign challenges to democracy and institutional capacity will test governance quality globally in 2018, especially as competitors manipulate social media to shape opinion.”

It added: “The number and sophistication of government efforts to shape domestic views of politics have increased dramatically in the past 10 years. In 2016, Freedom House identified 30 countries, including the Philippines, Turkey, and Venezuela, whose governments used social media to spread government views, to drive agendas, and to counter criticism of the government online.”

Mr. Roque in response said, “While it is true that the administration uses and maximizes social media to promote government messages and accomplishments, members of the political opposition and other cause-oriented groups use the same media platform to advance their agenda.”

“I don’t know of any government in the free world which does not use the Internet and social media to promote its agenda. This is very true especially in the case of the US. This latest intelligence assessment is a classic case in point.” — main report by Reuters with Arjay L. Balinbin

SENATOR Richard J. Gordon slammed a representative of Dengvaxia manufacturer Sanofi Pasteur over an earlier advisory to France’s overseas territories against the use of the dengue vaccine.

According to news reports, an agency of the French health ministry had recommended in 2016 against the use of the Dengvaxia vaccine in France’s overseas territories, the Carribean islands of La Martinique and Guadeloupe as well as French Guiana in the South American continent, due to health risks linked to the vaccine.

“If you cannot use it in Europe, why should we use it here? You guys have objected (to) my term guinea pigs. We are guinea pigs. We are laboratory rats. And people died,” Mr. Gordon said, addressing Sanofi Pasteur Asia-Pacific head Thomas Triomphe at Wednesday’s resumption of the hearing on the Dengvaxia controversy by the Senate blue ribbon committee.

Mr. Triomphe clarified that the body did not recommend the vaccine while it was under review by European health regulators.

“They don’t recommend the usage before the license because the product has been submitted for review….They’re saying, ‘Let’s wait for the license and use it with a license,’” he told senators.

For his part, Health Secretary Francisco T. Duque III said he had ordered health officials to convince families to avail themselves of common vaccines following a decline in the immunization coverage in certain regions due to the Dengvaxia controversy.

“My order to the DoH officials was to never stop and never give up, if they had to convince every family to let the DoH (Department of Health) give them vaccines for their children,” Mr. Duque said.

He cited the immunization coverage in the Zamboanga Peninsula as having dropped from 73% to 63% as parents refused to have their children avail themselves of common vaccines for measles and mumps due to fears brought about by the Dengvaxia controversy.

He also noted other factors to the decline, such as sickness and cultural belief against vaccines.

But Mr. Duque also said the immunization coverage in the Davao Region has slowly picked up after his orders to regional health officials.

He also stressed the importance of the Health department’s expanded immunization program, noting that about three million to five million lives were saved due to the vaccines.

The DoH has also launched several information campaigns on the safety of vaccines under the immunization program, which covers vaccine-preventable diseases such as hepatitis, rotavirus and tetanus. — Camille A. Aguinaldo

TEN SUSPECTED Islamic militants who were trying to establish a Malaysian cell of a Philippine kidnap-for-ransom group have been arrested in Borneo island, police said Wednesday.

The alleged extremists, mostly Filipinos, are also accused of trying to help fighters linked to the Islamic State (IS) group travel to the Philippines to join up with militants there, they said.

Malaysian police made the arrests in January and early February in the state of Sabah on the Malaysian part of Borneo.

Seven of those detained were Filipinos, including several senior members of Philippine extremist group Abu Sayyaf which has been behind kidnappings of numerous foreigners, Malaysian national police chief Mohamad Fuzi Harun said in a statement.

The other three detained were Malaysians, police said. Officials did not disclose the suspects’ identities. — AFP