Philippine Secretary of National Defense Delfin Negrillo Lorenzana said the three countries had been thinking about holding land operations, but they had yet to create a specific mechanism for such operations to happen.

“We don’t have any mechanism to do that — to bring troops to our land or to take troops to your land — because of constitutional bans,” he said in a seminar on terrorism held on the sidelines of the 2018 Indo Defense Expo and Forum.

In 2016, Indonesia proposed coordinated security operations with Malaysia and the Philippines to pursue militants that would stretch into the Philippines, arguing that the militants launched their attacks at sea and brought hostages to land, making cooperation on the ground necessary.

Lorenzana said the three countries had to make some sort of an agreement, such as a visiting forces agreement (VFA) that would allow troops from the three countries to enter other countries freely.

The VFA is an agreement between a host and foreign country that allows the latter’s military forces to enter the host. The Philippines signed such agreements with the United States in 1999 and Australia in 2012.

Lorenzana said it would take up to two years to work on the agreement and some concrete actions had been made on making it happen.

“Maybe initially we will have training. We will send people to train in your land or Sabah in Malaysia, and also in the Philippines. But for actual combat operation to run after them, it would take some time, up to two years,” he said.

Indonesian Defense Minister Ryamizard Ryacudu said troops from each country had two months of specialized training in their own countries, such as antiguerrilla and urban warfare.

“It’s two months [of training] in their own place, we tell them what the subject of the training is, and then they will meet in Tarakan [North Kalimantan],” he said.

Ryamizard said he was satisfied with the existing maritime and air patrols despite the latest kidnapping in September, where an armed group abducted two Indonesian fishermen while working on a Malaysian-flagged fishing vessel, Dwi Jaya I, in the waters off Gaya Island in Semporna, Sabah, Malaysia.

Having started kidnapping sailors in 2016, the Abu Sayyaf group is known to behead hostages unless a ransom is paid.

According to Foreign Ministry data, between 2014 to 2017 there were 32 Indonesians abducted in eight different cases in the waters between Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines. As of October 2017, 29 of them had been released.

Lorenzana also said he was happy with the outcome of the trilateral collaboration, saying that the Abu Sayyaf group were no longer kidnapping in the high seas but near the mainland, which he said was the remaining problem that needed to be resolved.

He assured that despite the VFA needing time, progress was being made “because we need this for cooperation and to chase after the bad guys.”

Meanwhile, Ryamizard said concluding such an agreement would not be a hassle.

“When the Philippines and Malaysia have agreed, it’s done, easy. We just have to take it to the House of Representatives and it’s done,” he said.

Popular

RI, Australia strengthen partnership on taxing crypto assets

Analysis: Indonesia denies normalization with Israel to enter OECD

Citroen to produce electric cars in Indonesia