Q: Good morning, Mr. President. 

PRESIDENT MARCOS: Good morning. Yes.

Q: What is your position on the plan of the International Criminal Court to investigate former President Rodrigo Duterte over his war on drugs? 

PRESIDENT MARCOS: My position hasn’t changed and I have stated it often even before I took office as President that there are many questions about their jurisdiction and what can be --- what we in the Philippines regard as an intrusion into our internal matters and a threat to our sovereignty. 

So no, I do not see what their jurisdiction is. I feel that we have in our police, in our judiciary, a good system. We do not need assistance from any outside entity, the Philippines is a sovereign nation and we are not colonies anymore of this former imperialist. So that is not something that we consider to be a legitimate judgment.

So until those questions of jurisdiction and the effects on the sovereignty of the Republic are sufficiently answered, I cannot cooperate with them. 

Q: Thank you, Mr. President.

Q: Good morning, Mr. President.

PRESIDENT MARCOS: Hi. Good morning.

Q: Sir, do you think it is now the right time to activate or to invoke the country’s Mutual Defense Treaty with the United States following the laser-pointing incident at the West Philippine Sea?

PRESIDENT MARCOS: Perhaps it is because if we activated that, what we are doing is escalating the --- intensifying the tensions in the area and I think that would be counterproductive.

Besides, despite the fact that it was a military-grade laser that was pointed at our Coast Guard, I do not think that that is sufficient for it to trigger the Mutual Defense Treaty.

So we are in constant contact of course with our treaty partners, not only with the United States but also our ASEAN partners and our partners here in Asia and that I think is the better recourse rather than to go directly to the Mutual Defense Treaty which again, I am very concerned would provoke the tensions rather than cool the tensions down.

Q: Thank you sir.

Q: Hi sir. Good morning.

PRESIDENT MARCOS: Hello. Good morning.

Q: Sir, what prompted you --- on China again sir, what prompted you to summon the Ambassador? Siyempre, malaking deal din ‘yun sir to summon him and how did the discussion go? What was discussed?

PRESIDENT MARCOS: Well, what were discussed, and I said that the laser-pointing incident was only a part of what we are seeing as intensifying or escalating of the actions of the militia --- marine militia of China, the coast guard of China, and the navy of China. 

And I --- actually I said we have to find a way around this because if we are such close friends such as China and the Philippines, these are not the kind of incidents that we should be talking about between the President and the Ambassador to the Philippines from China. 

And I reminded him that this was not what we agreed upon with President Xi when I visited him in Beijing.

So we are hoping that we can find a better way rather than these incursions into our maritime territory and the rather aggressive acts that we have been seeing in the past few weeks and months. 

Q: Naimbag nga aldaw mo apo. Considering the fact that the Cordillera is the watershed cradle of the north sir. What’s your policy direction towards protecting the environment in the Cordillera, especially mining sir?

PRESIDENT MARCOS: Well, I think in terms of protecting the environment, it’s very clear what the position of this government has always been. It has been an important part of all our policies, that we are environmentally conscious, that we are moving the economy towards green technologies, we are moving our production of power towards renewables so in that regard, all our forest cover is important and must remain --- that is giving the Philippines, we fall into the category of a carbon sink country because of our forest cover and so we --- that is a very valuable asset for the Philippines.

Now, in terms of monetizing, you can actually now monetize forest cover, you can give it a peso value, a dollar value, so that it can --- we can take advantage of being more active in promoting and monitoring, regulating, and encouraging the care of our forest cover, of all our environmental assets, it’s very, very important. 

When it comes to mining, mining is very clearly an important part of our plans for the economy, however, it’s clear that we do not want some of the incidents that we saw in the past few years to happen again.

And so it is really a question of enforcing the law in terms of responsible mining and that is what we will continue to do. We will always make sure that the mining companies who come in, once they are finished mining that they leave the site in the same condition as it was when they found it.

Q: Thank you sir. 

PRESIDENT MARCOS: Thank you. All right. Thank you very much. Thank you.

---  END ---

Location:  Philippine Military Academy, Fort Del Pilar, Baguio City