Palace: PHL inclusion on HK black list unfair

Malacañang on Thursday said the continuous inclusion of the Philippines on Hong Kong’s black travel list is unfair as it once again noted its efforts to convince Hong Kong to reverse it. “What we find unfair though is that we are being lumped up with Syria which, as you know, there’s a whale of a difference in the peace and order situation with Syria," presidential spokesperson Edwin Lacierda said at a press briefing. “We can only hope that they can see the improvements that we have made. We cannot dictate upon them. We can only improve our services," he added. The Philippines was put on Hong Kong’s black travel list after last year’s hostage tragedy in Manila that left eight Hong Kong tourists dead. The incident put to question the local police’s ability to handle crisis situations. To show the improvements undertaken after the hostage-taking incident, the Philippine government is set to conduct a familiarization tour with members of the Hong Kong Security Bureau, travel agencies and media. This is slated in September or October in coordination with the Department of Tourism. “The idea is to show to them the improvements that we have made and also the various tourist spots that Philippines has to offer. And, hopefully, we were supposed to present a demonstration of the crisis action force," Lacierda said. Lacierda hopes that with the government’s efforts, Hong Kong will eventually lift the black travel alert. “We have installed tourist cops, we’ve got the night courts. It’s not yet perfect but we continue to upgrade and orient the tourist police to have a firm but more friendly approach to tourists." “Yes, we continue to improve our services and all in the perspective of making sure that all tourists will be safe and also our own nationals," he added. - Amita O. Legaspi/KBK, GMA News