MANILA, Sept 1 (PIA) — Labor and Employment Secretary Silvestre H. Bello III yesterday urged displaced overseas Filipino workers in Saudi Arabia to avail of the repatriation program offered by the government. “Pinapakiusapan ko sila na mag-avail ng repatriation para makauwi na sa Pilipinas. Mahirap ang kalagayan nila dito sa Saudi Arabia,” said Bello who heads the 40-man Phippine Special Mission to Saudi Arabia. According to Bello, the goal is to repatriate the first batch of 2,000 […]
Tag: Saudi Arabia
DOLE aims more labor staff in Saudi Arabia
Labor Secretary Sivestre Bello III is looking into adding more personnel to the Philippine Overseas Labor Offices (POLO) to help more OFWs, particuarly those who are jobless due to oil price drop. “Unang-una, we will recommend additional officers kasi dito lang sa Jeddah there are more than 300,000 migrant workers. Ilan lang ang tao dito, wala pa yatang 20. How can you cater the needs of our contract workers kung ganyan lang ang manpower mo?”, […]
Philippines minister in Saudi over stranded workers
RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AFP) — Filipino and Saudi officials are working together to help thousands of stranded workers under a directive from King Salman, a diplomat said Wednesday as the Philippines labor secretary visited. The roughly 11,000 Filipinos are among tens of thousands of workers affected by financial troubles at the kingdom’s major construction firms. “Their salaries have not been paid, some of them for as long as eight months,” Iric Arribas, charge d’affaires at […]
Saudi facing ‘long’ Yemen war after talks fail
RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AFP) – by Ian Timberlake Six months after Saudi Arabia said its war in Yemen was winding down, air strikes are again pounding rebels and rockets flying across the border, with no end to the conflict in sight. Facing criticism of its bombing campaign and a budget crunch from low oil prices, Riyadh is keen to bring an end to the intervention it launched last year against Shiite Huthi rebels and their allies, […]
Rocket kills 7 civilians in Saudi as Yemen probe begins
RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AFP) – Saudi Arabia suffered its worst civilian death toll Tuesday in cross-border shelling from Yemen as an anti-rebel coalition it leads launched an investigation into a deadly strike on a hospital. A rocket fired by rebels in Yemen killed seven civilians in Najran city in the highest reported number of non-combattant casualties in the kingdom’s south since the Arab coalition intervened in Yemen 17 months ago. “It killed four citizens and three […]
DOLE to help stranded OFWs in Saudi Arabia
QUEZON City, Philippines – Labor and Employment Secretary Silvestre Bello III is going to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia for a special mission in order to repatriate more than 9, 000 stranded overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) who lost their jobs due to the oil crisis in Saudi Arabia. Secretary added that the OFWs will received aid from the Overseas Workers Welfare Administration (OWWA). Other than the DOLE, other government agencies included in the special mission to Saudi […]
Deadly coalition air strikes hit Yemen hospital
SANAA, Yemen (AFP) – Arab coalition air raids Monday hit a Yemeni hospital where international humanitarian group Doctors Without Borders operates, killing six people 48 hours after air strikes that killed children. The Paris-based Doctors Without Borders (MSF) tweeted that Abs hospital in the rebel-held northwestern province of Hajja “was targeted by air strikes today at 15:45 Yemen time (1245 GMT)”. Monday’s strikes killed six people and wounded 20, according to Ayman Mazkour, who heads […]
DSWD participates in humanitarian mission to help 11,000 stranded OFWs in Saudi Arabia
QUEZON CITY, Aug. 12 (PIA) — The Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) is participating in “Operation Bring Them Home: Special Mission for Stranded Overseas Filipinos (OFWs) in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA). The Mission’s overall objective is to bring home stranded/overstaying OFWs in crisis in the KSA. It will be conducted together with the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA), the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE), and the Department of Health. It […]
Multiple suicide blasts hit Saudi Arabia; four killed
by Ian Timberlake RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AFP) — At least four people died in suicide bombings in Saudi Arabia on Monday following attacks elsewhere in the region before the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. There were no immediate claims of responsibility for the three attacks one of which, at the Prophet’s Mosque in Medina, left four members of the security forces dead and others wounded. Since late 2014 Saudi Arabia has […]
Saudi cabinet approves economic diversification plan
JEDDAH, Saudi Arabia (AFP) — The Saudi cabinet has approved a major plan to diversify the national economy away from oil with an aim to generate 450,000 jobs in non-government sectors by 2020, officials said Tuesday. The National Transformation Program (NTP) 2020 also aims to cut public expenditures by 40 percent over the next five years and boost the contribution of the private sector, officials said. NTP is one of several programs designed to achieve […]
Syrian and Russian aircraft step up bombing of Aleppo city – monitor
(Reuters) Nearly 50 air strikes hit rebel-held areas in and around the Syrian city of Aleppo on Sunday in some of the heaviest recent raids by Russian and Syrian government aircraft, residents and a monitoring group said. The group, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, also said an unidentified war plane had crashed in countryside south of Aleppo, in an area where Islamist rebel fighters are battling the Syrian army and Iranian-backed forces. It […]
Iran: Saudi the real ‘terrorism sponsor’
Iranian flags. (File photo) Tehran, Iran (AFP)—Tehran on Sunday dismissed its renewed blacklisting by Washington as a state sponsor of terrorism, charging that it was United States allies including Riyadh that were the real culprits. The Iranian foreign ministry noted its role in neighboring Iraq supporting the government against the Islamic State jihadist group independently of a US-led coalition, as well as its backing for the Syrian regime against jihadists and other rebels, some […]
