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Palauan leader refuses frisking, denied fligh

The president of the Palau was briefly stranded in the Philippine capital when a US airline refused to allow him aboard a flight without being frisked, officials said yesterday.

Adding a bizarre twist to the incident, the Continental Airlines flight that Palau President Tommy Remengasau would have boarded was targeted by a bomb threat called in to police and was forced to turn back. No bomb was found.

Police would not say whether they thought the two incidents might be linked.

APOLOGY

Palau Ambassador Ramon Rechebei said the Philippines has apologized for Wednesday night’s incident and had paid for a private aircraft to take Remengasau, his wife and ministers to Palau’s capital, Koror, yesterday.

Remengasau was scheduled to leave Manila on a Continental Airlines flight, but he refused to be frisked and returned to his hotel instead, Rechebei said.

Rechebei said it was embarrassing for the Palau leader to undergo inspection at the airport, where Philippine officials, led by Vice President Noli de Castro, were on hand to see him off.

The vice president and other Philippine diplomats tried to intervene and asked that Remengasau be exempted from the search in accordance with protocol for visiting heads of state, but the airline refused to budge, airport officials said.

Officials at Continental could not immediately be reached for comment.

The commercial flight was scheduled to take off at 9:45pm but left shortly after midnight without Remengasau.

At least three Palau ministers and the head of the country’s senate boarded the flight after being frisked, Rechebei said.

BOMB THREAT

About an hour after take off, authorities received the bomb threat and the flight had to return to the airport, said Senior Superintendent Efren Labiang, director of police aviation security group.

Inspection of the aircraft and passengers showed no bomb, he said.

The airport control tower said it received a call from the air force, saying it had an intelligence report that a bomb might be on board the plane.

The flight, with 129 passengers on board, finally left at 4:35am yesterday, Labiang said.

Rechebei said the Palau officials on board decided to stay behind when the plane returned to Manila. He said they would take the private plane with Remengasau.

On Wednesday, Remengasau and Philippine President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo witnessed the signing of four agreements between their countries on air services, medical tourism, education and telecommunications.

The two leaders also sought each other’s cooperation on facing challenges like terrorism, climate change and rising oil and food prices.

Palau, an island chain of about 200 islands, only eight of which are permanently inhabited with a total of about 20,000 people, is about 1,287km southwest of Guam and 805km east of the Philippines.
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