(Adds Duterte's comments)
MANILA, Feb 15 (Reuters) - The United States is providing
the Philippines with military aid that amounts to "loose change"
compared to other Asian countries, a top government spokesman
said on Monday, supporting demands by President Rodrigo Duterte
for Washington to pay more.
Duterte said last week the United States should pay more if
it wants to maintain the two-decade old Visiting Forces
Agreement (VFA), which he unilaterally cancelled last year in an
angry response to an ally being denied a U.S. visa.
"If we have very strong ties with a very strong ally then I
think it also comes with a higher amount of financial assistance
to be given," presidential spokesman Harry Roque told a regular
briefing.
Roque cited a study by the Washington-based Stimson Center,
which showed the Philippines received $3.9 billion in U.S.
counter-terrorism support from 2002-2017 compared to the $16.4
billion for Pakistan over the same period.
"We got $3.9 billion. Is that a huge amount? That's loose
change compared to what other countries were getting," he said.
The militaries of the two countries enjoy close ties, forged
during decades of joint exercises that have boosted the
capability of Philippine forces while giving the United States
an important foothold in a region where China's power and
influence is growing.
Defence officials from both countries are trying to salvage
the VFA, which underpins the Mutual Defense Treaty and an
Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement. Duterte has threatened
to scrap all of them. The U.S. embassy in Manila did not immediately respond to a
request for comment. In December, it said the Philippines
received the most U.S. military assistance in the Indo-Pacific
region, having received 33 billion pesos ($689 million) worth of
hardware.
Roque said Duterte was upholding the national interest and
not committing extortion, as some critics, including vice
president Leni Robredo, have said. His demand was for
compensation, because the rotating U.S. troop presence put the
Philippines at risk.
Duterte schooled Robredo about foreign policy making, saying
the power to determine and shape foreign relations rests with
the president.
"It is not money I am asking for ... we should be provided
with arms and armaments that could place us at equal footing
with countries at war with us," Duterte said in a late
night-televised address.
He told Robredo, who was elected separately to him and is
expected to be the opposition's presidential bet in next year's
elections: "You are not qualified to run for president. You do
not know your role in government."
Robredo's spokesman did not immediately respond to a request
for comment.