Some 2,300 Filipinos in Syria have been urged to immediately avail of the Philippine government’s mandatory repatriation programme, amid the start of US air strikes against a Syrian extremist group.
Charles Jose, spokesman for the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA), said in a text message yesterday that the crisis alert level 4, or mandatory repatriation, has been raised for Syria.
Alert level 4 has been raised there since December 2011 because of a civil war triggered by the Arab Spring in March of that year.
The DFA had repatriated 5,473 Filipinos from Syria as of September 2014.
Jose said neither the department nor the Philippine embassy in Damascus has received information that the 2,300 Filipinos remaining in Syria have been affected by the air strikes.
The repatriation programme is ongoing, he added.
“Hopefully, more OFWs (overseas Filipino workers) will avail of the repatriation programme,” Jose said.
Yesterday, the US confirmed that it began its bombing of Islamic State targets inside Syria. This is the first time the Obama administration has authorised a military operation against an Arab nation after he decided to pull out American troops from Iraq and Afghanistan during his first term in the White House.
The air strikes primarily focused on the ISIS stronghold of Raqqa, although other locations were hit as well.
Obama earlier announced the expansion of military efforts beyond Iraq, the US response to the beheading of two American journalists by the jihadist group.
A British aid worker was also beheaded recently.
The US called on its allies and partners to join an international coalition it heads to take down the Al Qaeda-linked group.
In the air strikes, all foreign partners joining the US were Arab countries which included Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates and Jordan.
The US used fighters, bombers and Tomahawk missiles in its bid to cripple the Islamic States’ command and control, resupply, logistics and training ground.
The Foreign Affairs department called on the next-of-kin of Filipino workers in Syria to get in touch with the embassy.