Free Republic

THE HAGUE — The assets of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) and its exiled founder Jose Ma. Sison have been frozen following a request from the United States, which had put the group on a "terrorist" blacklist, the Dutch government said Tuesday. Dutch Foreign Ministry spokesman Bart Jochems said the Netherlands authorities have also asked European Union member-countries to freeze assets of the CPP and Sison. At Malacañang, President Arroyo welcomed yesterday the Dutch government’s move, saying she hoped such act would "hasten the peace talks" that may lead the CPP-NPA to participate in the parliamentary struggle instead...

Recently, I received a message from the Airline Pilots' Security Alliance (1), which is a coalition of the Allied Pilots' Association, the Coalition of Airline Pilots' Associations, the Air Line Pilots' Association, and the Independent Pilots' Association. The message concerned arming commercial airline pilots, but it provided some very good information the national media seems to have overlooked. For instance: “Most people don't know that for many decades after the dawn of commercial aviation, airline pilots carried firearms in the cockpit without incident. However, in late 1987, after a suicidal attacker broke into the cockpit of an airliner, murdered the...