The National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) on Friday approved the registration of Starlink Internet Services Philippines Inc. (Starlink) -- a subsidiary of Elon Musk’s SpaceX --allowing the satellite internet provider to begin offering its services in the country.

In a statement, NTC Commissioner Gamaliel Cordoba said Starlink has been approved as a value-added service (VAS) provider, allowing direct access to satellite systems, and the construction and operation of broadband facilities.

“The NTC is steadfast in helping ensure that roll-out of Starlink’s internet access services will be done expeditiously and professionally,” Cordoba said.

Starlink, a low-Earth orbit satellite system designed to bring broadband services to remote areas, is expected to offer low latency satellite internet in the country between 100 Megabits per second (Mbps) to 200 Mbps.

The Philippines is set to be the first country in Southeast Asia to have Starlink broadband service -- allowing Filipinos in remote areas to enjoy low latency internet services such as video calls, online gaming, streaming, and other “high data” activities that were previously difficult with regular satellite internet.

“Starlink is expected to cover villages in urban and suburban areas and rural areas that remain unserved or underserved with internet access services. The service is expected to bring cost-effective internet access in these areas,” Cordoba said.

SpaceX counsel, lawyer Bien Marquez from the law firm Quisumbing Torres, thanked the NTC for its “prompt action,” noting that Starlink’s VAS license was issued 30 minutes after their submission of registration and complete requirements.

“This shows the government’s seriousness in addressing the connectivity needs of our country in unserved and underserved areas. This will also prepare us in the event of natural disasters and calamities,” Marquez said.

In May, Department of Trade and Industry Secretary Ramon Lopez said Starlink is expected to jumpstart its operations before the end of President Rodrigo Duterte’s term in June.

From right side is former US President Donald Trump, near him President Joe Biden. The Wu Han Institute of Virology, you will see below two presidents of United States the frontliners. From left side is the logo of W.H.O. (World Health Organization).

As another wave of infections hit the United States, together with the Afghanistan debacle, President Joe Biden and the European Union called for a reinvestigation of the Wuhan lab, placing “intelligence” officials rather than scientists at the head of the investigation.

Despite the White House pushing for indictment after three months of the investigation, the intelligence reported the findings inconclusive and made the report confidential – but not before announcing that a “partially screened” version would be made public.

The US under Trump and Biden aggressively pushed the World Health Organization to trace the alleged virus leak to the Wuhan lab. The US, however, bans the WHO from investigating any of some 200 US-owned biolabs worldwide.

In comparison, China allowed top global scientists to go to Wuhan as early as January 2020, where the WHO director general even met President Xi Jinping, and 25 of the best scientists from the US, Germany, Japan, South Korea and Singapore, among others, visited Guangdong, Wuhan and Sichuan, concluded that there was no evidence to link the virus to a Wuhan lab leak.

The US Chairman of Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley as early as April 2020 also said there was “no weight of evidence” that the virus originated from a lab. Scientists around the world concurred by a great majority.

In April 2020, Politico revealed that a 57-page memo was being circulated to American politicians telling them they should not defend Trump’s handling of the pandemic and instead, pivot to blaming the Chinese government if Trump’s response is questioned.

Why is the mainstream media deafeningly silent about the continued US refusal to allow WHO inspection on any of her biolabs, even after 25 million signed an online petition to probe Fort Detrick? The US closed Fort Detrick in 2019 for breaches of safety protocols. Fort Detrick was among 200 labs around the world, funded by the US government for years to research, among other things, making animal viruses transmissible to humans.

Biolabs safety protocols have periodically been compromised

Animal diseases like hoof and mouth were believed to have leaked in 2007 as well as possibly a 1977 flu strain that closely resembled one nonexistent for 20 years already. Vials have gone missing as well, among other “accidental leaks”; not counting the viruses and bacteria used to infect early North and South American Indians to decimate them and possibly appeared in the Korean and Vietnam wars.

The US also not only recruited and protected from war crimes prosecution but also supported the perpetrators of horrific human experimentation, the “731 unit” of Japan and the nuclear scientists of Germany of World War 2. The biowarfare labs of the US were built by these experts, which conducted live freezing, compression-decompression, mutilations and infections on thousands of live Chinese, Russians and others.

Flu researchers led by Ron Fouchier of the Erasmus Medical Center in Netherlands announced they would engineer a new H7N9 avian flu to give it new possibly deadlier capabilities. He is the scientist who two years ago adopted the H5N1 flu strain to allow it to pass from human to human, which it could not do in its natural form. These research centers were supported by the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and others outside of the US, which would put the health, security and legal risk outside of the United States, and any accidents or scandals can be blamed on foreign countries (Forbes 2013, Steven Salzberg Professor of Biomedical Engineering at Johns Hopkins University).

Fouchier companion Yoshihiro Kawaoka admitted the virus’ pandemic risk would rise exponentially if it gained the ability to spread easily among people. Which is what we are experiencing today.

These are just a few of the researchers used by the US supposedly to find antidotes for pandemics, but why is it then that the US had the worst Covid pandemic management despite the highest resources of both talent and financing? Flu expert Michael Osterholm is quoted by Salzberg, molecular biology professor of John Hopkins, that this research of Fouchier group had not contributed to better our ability to respond to any pandemic or creation of vaccine, as the covid experience shows in the US.

Former assistant State secretary for international security and nonproliferation Christopher Ford was attacked as traitorous by the mainstream Western establishment, including media CNN, Fox News and Vanity Fair for pushing for competent scientists’ vetting of the Trump administration’s assertions of the “lab-leak theory,” rather than by unqualified intel researchers.

There is much information that seems to indicate earlier possible coronavirus precursor incidents in Italy and other parts of Europe and the US. US CDC Director Robert Redfield himself admitted in a Congressional hearing in March 2020 that the US had misdiagnosed Covid deaths as influenza. The US also had record influenza deaths and vaping-related illnesses in 2019.

The mayor of Belleville, New Jersey, Michael Melham, reported he contracted the novel coronavirus symptoms in November 2019, even before they were experienced in China.

The disastrous US mismanagement of Covid is a reality of the most advanced healthcare system and bio-research in the world having the highest infections and deaths. The US has over 630,000 deaths, India (an ally of the US that was also betrayed by the Americans for promised vaccines assistance that never came) has over 430,000 deaths and where the Indian virus “Delta-variant” originated, while China had 4,600. Even assuming 10x data inaccuracy, any visit to China and statistics of its products and verifiable travel logs clearly show far better management of the covid and continued high social and economic activity.

This US mismanagement of Covid – despite warnings and forums by WHO to the world, and information from China and Europe starting January 2020 (detailed WHO timelines in WHO website), and by US intel reports themselves even from 2019 – is being addressed by blaming China. This poor pandemic response was due to Trump and anti-science US voters’ concerns with individual freedoms, escalating these to illogical levels, not believing in masks or distancing, and looking for scapegoats instead. India’s massive death toll was also partly largely due to US blocking vaccination or raw materials and Indian government decisions.

America only wants the world to focus on China – another ploy to distract its domestic audience from its own incompetence on Covid, to distract the world audience from the abuses and failures of the US, rather than work on solutions together and assist others. China assisted 150 countries, while the US blocked vaccines and raw materials from the world during critical months.

The US has a history of not learning from and dealing with its failures by blaming or invading others.

China has already opened its facilities for examinations. What is keeping the US from following suit?

Jan Albert Suing has been conducting policy research for both the public and private sectors, with some of his works published in “Population Ageing in the PH: Issues and Challenges”; and “Towards an ASEAN Parliament: Challenges and Prospects.” He taught at Far Eastern University and received his master’s degree in International Studies from UP Diliman.

Social networking site Facebook has warned National Security Adviser (NSA) Hermogenes Esperon, Jr. due to his post calling on Filipinos to unite against communist rebel group members including those “who have infiltrated the Congress,” a spokesperson of the anti-insurgency task force said Wednesday.

In a statement, National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC) spokesperson Jonathan Malaya said Facebook’s warning to Esperon was offensive and alarming.

“The imprudence of FB to warn Secretary Esperon on a national security issue is unthinkable and downright offensive as the social media platform has taken on the role of Big Brother with the power to censure the social media posts of the NSA himself on matters of national security,” he said.

“This move of FB is alarming, if not dangerous, as it has appointed itself as an omnipotent force that can censure at their discretion — based on standards that they themselves created — the legitimate posts of highly respected officials of the country,” he added.

According to Malaya, the NTF-ELCAC questioned Facebook and its supposed biased fact-checkers for being overly focused in restricting and calling out government officials but allegedly ignoring others.

Due to this, Malaya said the NTF-ELCAC is urging Facebook to revisit and modify its “one-sided” standards that supposedly promotes the interests of the few and powerful.

Malaya, who is also the spokesperson of the Department of the Interior and Local Government, added that the DILG is also denouncing the warning issued to Esperon.

“The DILG denounces Facebook and its biased fact-checkers for their imprudence and audacity to issue a warning to no less than the country’s NSA Hermogenes Esperon, Jr. for his FB post on April 14, 2022 urging all Filipinos to unite to end the Communist insurgency,” he said.

Malaya called on Facebook to stick to its goal of connecting people and “to leave national security matters to the experts.”

In a Facebook post, Esperon questioned the action of the social media giant, saying that he knows better than it does when it comes to national security matters of the country.

“I should know better than you do on matters of national security,” he said in a post on Monday showing a screenshot of the warning from Facebook.

“How come I was restricted by Facebook when I shared a status about ending the insurgency in the country? As the NSA, I sure know what I’m talking about and have basis for it. How did I violate the community standards when I only shared the truth,” he added.


I should know better than you do on matters of national security.
How come I was restricted by Facebook when I shared a status about ending the insurgency in the country? As the NSA, I sure know what I’m talking about and have basis for it. How did I violate the community standards when I only shared the truth?
— Hermogenes “Jun” Cendaña Esperon Jr.
Based on the screenshot, Facebook was pertaining to the April 14 post of Esperon saying:

“In ending insurgency, the Filipinos must unite against armed struggle and against all organizations, aboveground and underground, that support the New People’s Army, including Communist Party (CPP) members who have infiltrated the Congress through the partylist system…” the post read.

(From left) Commission on Elections spokesman James Jimenez, Rappler Chief Executive Officer Maria Ressa, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Solicitor General Jose Calida.
WE may well be headed for war in the Philippines. The Philippines is letting inciters of revolutions into the heart of our election process. Why are we letting Rappler, which receives some $150,000 a year from the National Endowment for Democracy, or NED, the known funder of antigovernment protest groups, including violent rioters, in the Arab and Ukraine revolutions and Hong Kong protests, the financial arm of the CIA as admitted by the former head of NED, Alan Weinstein, himself, be the official media partner of the Commission on Elections (Comelec)? During the height of the Hong Kong protests, Dr. Michael Pillsbury of Hudson Institute admitted that the NED also funded “millions of dollars of programs” in Hong Kong. Sen. Francis “Kiko” Pangilinan had glorified the rioters as freedom fighters yet did not report on the rioters receiving foreign funding and training. Why should the US be allowed to be the official observer in our elections?

How do they incite revolutions? Aside from funding, training and organizing parties, western and NED-supported media will block almost all news unfavorable to the US and its allies, and will magnify criticisms of non-allies and create anger, hatred and ridicule. Examples?

The western media and Rappler demonizes Russia but won’t tell you that the Ukrainian government closed three TV stations and imprisoned opposition leaders, disallowed the use of Russian language, and attacked the Donbas region they were supposed to give autonomy to by the Minsk agreement signed in front of the European Union, killing some 15,000, mostly civilians.

The elected Ukraine government was overthrown with US support, including with US white supremacist-supported neo-Nazis, such as the Azov Battalion attacking and burning people and government buildings, using swastikas and similar symbols, marching with torches evenings in 2014, and honoring as hero Stepan Bandera, who had collaborated with the Germans including in the ethnic cleansing of the Poles and Jews.‌

The Ukraine war was warned against already years ago by Kissinger, historians and diplomats, building up for over a decade due to acts from the West’s five waves of NATO aggression. The US and NATO promised not to recruit and arm the European countries but entered over a dozen countries to the very border of Russia and refused to sign an agreement not to arm Ukraine against Russia, refusing to even put it on the agenda.

If Russia followed US methods, carpet bombing and missiles would have taken Kyiv in a few days after a bloodbath, or Ukraine leaders could have been assassinated with drones like the US did to Soleimani. But Russia is for now still leaving room and time for diplomacy, unlike the US executions of foreign leaders.

Russia and China immediately sent emergency weapons and bullets for our soldiers in the Marawi Crisis, when President Duterte requested for assistance after the US and Europe initially blocked much-needed arms delivery.

That Sabah, rich in gold, oil and agricultural resources, with actual territory and boundaries, clearly documented to be Sulu Sultanate’s territory, was acceded to Malaysia by the US and UK, and the Aquinos. Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. is acting as Twitter bird on this issue.

The US still is refusing to pay Philippine veterans, hundreds of thousands who died in guerilla war against Japan on behalf of the US on promise of Roosevelt… and many other cover ups too many to mention here but will share in another.

This is not to downplay that there are mostly peace loving Ukrainians, hardworking and fun, a talented and courageous leader in Volodymyr Zelenskyy, but why are the other extremist sides not being shown or reported? The same with not showing the regular Russians, even Putin, not really intent on conquest but legitimately concerned with their long-term security given the decades of invasions and strangulations of nations by the US.

These types of provocative one-sided portrayals raise anger and resentment, especially when stoked further by fake or biased news, now being used against Russia and Filipinos that are not pro-US, like the following:

– That Heroic Snake Island Ukrainians all died defending against Russia after telling it to “f*** off,” when in fact the 82 soldiers were abandoned by the European Union, surrendered, were given food and water and most were allowed to go home

– “Ghost of Kyiv” shown on video to have destroyed 6 to 10 Russian jets…was really just a ghost. The footage turned out to come from a Digital combat video game.

– Italian news showing war coverage of a rain of missiles actually also came from video games.

¬ German reporter with video of massive explosion supposed to be from Ukraine but was from a chemical plant explosion in 2015 in Tianjin.

Do these fake presentations sound familiar, with the Stratbase Albert del Rosario Institute (ADRi) using a US-based satellite firm Simularity portraying a human waste-releasing ship as Chinese, spread all over world media, when it turned out to be an Australian dredge boat picture from years back?

Isn’t this similar to portraying 3 million Chinese tourists to the Philippines as invaders taking over Filipino jobs?

Another threat to our elections, US-funded Rappler, with a record of biased news or selective reporting and foreign support in millions of dollars, being given an official role in the National Elections by the Comelec, should be unacceptable to any self-respecting country or even to an organization with any integrity.

Why are former associate justice Antonio Carpio, former Foreign Affairs secretary Albert del Rosario, UP professor Jay Batongbacal, DLSU professor Renato de Castro, et al. quiet on direct US meddling in our elections but raise a howl on unproven, “Possibilities” of a “Manchurian Candidate”? Why have Rappler, Inquirer and ABS-CBS not reported on the US embassy lobbying in Comelec to have an official poll watchers role in our elections — when the US involved itself in Egyptian, Venezuelan, Iraqi, Ukrainian and other elections; when these nations saw coups, color revolutions, “Arab springs,” “Ukrainian Springs,” and eventually collapse.

“Rappler is the ‘least trusted’ media entity in the country. This is like a ‘free-pass’ on Rappler to mold public opinion. And given their known bias toward other candidates, their participation can only heighten the public’s apprehension that the coming election would not be fair, credible and transparent,” argued National Press Club President Paul Gutierrez. How was the spokesman for Comelec James Jimenez able to get the Comelec Acting Chairman Socorro Inting to sign the memorandum of agreement with Rappler?

Rappler has never denied it received US funding and instead of addressing the conflict of interest, is painting Solicitor General Jose Calida as someone who is associated with the Marcoses. What about Rappler clear support of a candidate, CEO Maria Ressa hobnobbing with a particular candidate, reporting on 4,000 vehicles in the early caravans of the particular candidate with no credible picture and refuted by the people on the ground? Sponsoring an online poll that Rappler itself took down after netizens caught countless questionable Arab and Vietnamese accounts voting for Vice President Leni Robredo.

The petition that was reaching 150,000 signatories asking the Nobel Prize to rescind Ressa’s award was also taken down. Obvious achievements by Duterte or assistance by China are downplayed or ignored, even criticized further. US pledges, even unfulfilled, are magnified.

After Ukraine, the Philippines is next. We should avoid becoming the Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen of Asia.

Ukraine lessons for PH: Biolabs, financial warfare, nuclear leaks, peace prospects?
History, betrayals behind Ukraine invasion
The US and NATO promised not to recruit and arm the European countries but entered over a dozen countries to the very border of Russia and refused to sign an agreement not to arm Ukraine against Russia, refusing to even put it on the agenda.

A University of the Philippines-Mindanao (UP-Min) alumnus has confirmed that recruitment activities are being carried out by the communist New People’s Army (NPA), sometimes even with the help of their mentor.

“Yes, there is (an) active recruitment. Let me correct you in your denial that there is no active recruitment on UP campuses. There is, and it starts with the words critical thinking,” Choyax Cagape, a former UP Min student, said in a Facebook post on May 14.

Cagape was responding to denials made by some of his classmates about the supposed NPA’s non-existent recruitment activities inside UP-Min.

As of this writing, the post gained over 2,500 reactions, 251 comments, and 1,500 shares.

Most of the netizens who commented on Cagape’s post appreciated him for his bravery, while some offered corroborations about his claim, citing their own experiences with the school as well.

“To my classmates in UP Mindanao, I do not know how to react when you post denials that there is no active recruitment of the NPA in UP Mindanao. I do not like to post arguments on your posts, so I will just make my own,” Cagape said.

Cagape narrated that when he was then the election body chairperson of the student body in his first year, a teacher introduced him to “subversive ideology.”

“You all know her; she called me an admin loyalist when I did not postpone the elections due to lack of ‘representation of all the sectors of the student body. Even to the point of calling me a bourgeoisie,” he said.

Cagape claimed he knew some classmates and or other UP-Min students who went to the mountains without finishing school because they had already been recruited by the NPA.

“And yes I visited one of the ‘offices’ of leftists off campus, and it was filled with Maoist propaganda, a newspaper filled with anti-government sentiments,” he said.

More Proof

Arian Jane Ramos, former secretary of an NPA unit under the Southern Mindanao Regional Committee, said her journey with the NPA started with being an activist until she was introduced to NPA’s legal fronts inside the school.

Ramos is a UP-Min Bachelor of Arts in Communication graduate.

Ramos said schools have been the NPA’s favorite recruitment grounds, attracting students to join leftist groups first then recruiting them to be party members. The final step would be to join the armed struggle in the mountains.

Ramos recalled that it was during an election in their school that they were introduced to the candidates under the Alyansa ng mga Aktibong Kabataan ng UP Mindanao (ANAK UP-Min).

“Their lines were very sharp. They were discussing educational issues, economics, politics, international relations in the Philippines,” she recalled in an interview Thursday.

The Anak UP Min, according to Ramos, is a coalition of NPA fronts inside the campus.

However, Ramos said she did not join the ANAK UPMin, and instead, she became interested in the Gabriela Youth as she was very interested in women’s issues and gender equality.

Their group created the UP Mindanao Gabriela Youth Chapter, which later expanded to other universities to recruit students and organize more school-based chapters.

“Then I was introduced to Makibaka, the underground mass organization of women, Independent Movement of Modern Women. I was given orientation, so there, I found out that it was guided by the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP),” Ramos said.

Ramos blamed her radicalization on the exposure she had with NPA front organizations inside UP-Min.

Meanwhile, Joy Saguino, the former secretary of the NPA Guerrilla Front 20, challenged the UP Board of Regents and Chancellors to make a clear stance on NPA’s recruitment within the campuses of UP.

“If critical thinking is vital to the institution in pursuit of truth, where’s critical thinking in this series of denial when more than a handful of UP alumni either have died in battles or have returned to the mainstream, alive and are sharing their untold stories? Some even remain to be active NPA leaders up to this date,” she said in an online post on Wednesday.

The CPP-NPA is listed as a terrorist organization by the United States, the European Union, the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the Philippines.

The NDF has been formally designated as a terrorist organization by the Anti-Terrorism Council on June 23, 2021, citing it as “an integral and inseparable part” of the CPP-NPA created in April 1973.