KUWAIT has invited Philippine President Rodrigo R. Duterte to visit, state news agency KUNA said on Monday, as the countries seek to settle their differences over allegations of extreme abuse of migrant workers in the wealthy Gulf state.

After the body of a Filipino was discovered in a freezer in a Kuwait apartment, Mr. Duterte arranged free flights for workers wishing to leave — an evacuation that Kuwait said was an unnecessary escalation of a diplomatic rift.

The Philippines suspended sending workers to Kuwait in January after reports that abuse by employers had driven several to suicide.

Two planes full of workers arrived in Manila from Kuwait last week on flights provided for free by commercial airlines at the President’s request. The Philippine Labor secretary has said more than 2,200 Filipinos were ready to take up the offer to be repatriated.

Kuwait’s Deputy Foreign Minister Khalid al-Jarallah said on Monday that the two countries had agreed to sign a deal to regulate working conditions.

“We proposed to the Philippine authorities to resolve and contain these issues and not to escalate them in the media. There was agreement on this…and we received a response,” he was quoted as saying.

It was not immediately clear if Mr. Duterte had accepted Kuwait’s invitation for him to visit in early March.

In his briefing on Tuesday, Presidential Spokesperson Herminio Harry L. Roque, Jr. said, “I have no information that the President has accepted the invitation. I know there’s an invitation extended but I know ministerial talks are ongoing. Ministerial talks have to do with (a) bilateral agreement safeguarding the plight of our overseas workers in Kuwait.”

“But I do not have information if the invitation has been accepted and this is as of yesterday around 5:30 p.m., when I had a conversation with both Secretary Alan Cayetano and the Secretary of Labor,” he added.

Mr. Roque further clarified: “The language used was they prefer that if there’s a visit, there would be already a bilateral agreement in place. But that’s not made into a condition. It’s a preference.” — main report by Reuters

By Camille A. Aguinaldo

AN OFFICIAL of the Department of Transportation (DoTr) said at a Senate hearing on Tuesday that all train coaches of the Metro Rail Transit-3 (MRT-3) have been long overdue for a general overhaul, and that the tracks too need to be replaced.

“The overhaul was supposed to be due last 2016…So, the whole fleet is really overdue for overhaul,” Undersecretary for Rails Timothy John Batan said at the hearing by the Senate committee on public services on the problems hounding the MRT-3.

Mr. Batan said the train coaches were supposed to be overhauled every eight years. The last time this procedure was undertaken, he said, was 2007 to 2009.

He added that the previous maintenance provider, Busan Universal Rail, Inc. (BURI), was required to overhaul 43 of 72 train coaches as part of its contract with the government.

“When the government took over, they should have completed 26 according to (the) general overhaul schedule. But they only finished three,” he said.

Mr. Batan also identified the many issues which caused frequent disruptions and fewer operating trains, describing the condition of the busiest train system as being in a “really deteriorating state.”

He said the railway system has experienced maintenance difficulties because of a series of short-term contracts with maintenance providers which hampered them from making the necessary investments for properly maintaining the system.

He also pointed out that some components, such as the signaling system, were being reconditioned instead of being replaced, which affected the trains’ reliability.

“Even though it was reconditioned, it would still work but not as reliable as it would have been if we replaced them with new spare parts,” he said.

The DoTr official also noted that the signaling system should have been replaced last 2015 based on international standards.

MRT-3’s railway tracks, Mr. Batan added, also needed to be replaced even though it could have lasted for 100 years if properly maintained.

He said they would also need two years to finish replacing the needed components for the trains as they would keep the operations running while they accomplish the rehabilitation only during non-revenue hours.

The MRT-3 management is also targeting to increase the number of operating trains from seven to 10 by the end of February with the arrival of spare parts and eventually to 15 trains after the Holy Week break.

As for bringing back the MRT’s reliability, Mr. Batan said they would need six months.

He added that the general overhaul program which would restore the MRT’s 20 trains with the rehabilitation service provider is a three-year period that would start on May.

Senator Grace Poe-Llamanzares, chair of the committee, asked DoTr officials to regularly update them on the developments in the MRT rehabilitation.

“We appreciate your work. We know that this is a sacrifice on your part….We need that fixed timetable for the completion of repairs and rehabilitation, instead of open-ended assurances and big promises,” she said.

“Now you have to be able to offer something in return to our passengers. It’s not so much to ask of the government to make it a little bit more convenient for us,” she added.

THE CHIEF of the Philippines’ main Muslim rebel group warned Tuesday that jihadists loyal to the Islamic State (IS) group, flush with looted guns and cash, could seize another Filipino city after Marawi last year.

Murad Ebrahim has billed his Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), which has made peace with the government, as a rival to IS for the hearts and minds of angry young Muslims in the impoverished south of the mainly Catholic nation.

Mr. Murad said the MILF was battling pro-IS groups for influence in schools as the jihadists worked to infiltrate madrasas (Islamic religious schools) and secular universities.

At the same time IS gunmen were making their way into the southern Philippinesf rom Malaysia and Indonesia, he added, but gave no estimates.

A five-month siege flattened the city of Marawi on the southern island of Mindanao, the Philippines’ main Islamic center, and claimed more than 1,100 lives.

Mr. Murad told reporters conditions on the ground were still ripe for another Marawi-style siege.

“This ISIS group continues to penetrate us because they are being displaced in the Middle East and they want to have another place,” he said, using another name for IS.

“The chances of having another Marawi cannot be overruled.”

The Marawi attackers found and looted stockpiles of munitions, cash and jewelry from homes — some owned by MILF members — before the city was retaken by US-backed Filipino troops in October, Mr. Murad said.

“When they (MILF members) fled from Marawi they (could) not bring their vaults. That is where the ISIS was also able to get so much money and now they’re using it for recruitment,” he added.

“It’s very sad. In our country some people say buying weapons and ammunition is just like buying fish in the market.”

The combination of weak central government authority, the presence of rebel groups and long-running blood feuds means Mindanao is awash with weapons, he also said.

Manila signed a peace deal with the 10,000-member MILF in 2014 after decades of Muslim rebellion in Mindanao for independence or self-rule that had claimed more than 100,000 lives.

Mr. Murad urged President Rodrigo R. Duterte’s government to speed up the passage of a Muslim self-rule law to flesh out the peace accord, warning pro-IS militants were recruiting for a new attack.

“If the (self-rule law) will not be passed now I think it will develop a situation where these extremist groups can recruit more adherents, because it will prove their theory that there is no hope in the peace process,” he said.

“Since they have the capability also to supply money and then they also have the ability to make explosives, bombs, they can just use these young recruits to work out their plan.” — AFP