The world benefited further from this cooperation with the establishment of an effective template for adoption of similar mechanisms. We also have the learnings from the creation of the information-sharing centre in vision and the regional cooperation agreement against piracy in the Asia-Pacific.
The ISCs clear manifestation of our communal resolve to activate concrete and effective mechanism to address the threats against the free-flow of goods and people across national boundaries. This development is in responding to maritime security challenges and maximising opportunities for cooperation in the region for a timely opportunity. The employment of defence forces in general and the maritime forces in particular for regional security concerns.
With so much space to control and violative laws to enforce, the involvement of naval forces in maritime law enforcement and socio-economic development, on a trans-national basis will continue to grow. This is made urgent by the need to develop ways to pre-empt threats rather than respond to them. Prevention is a more cost-efficient investment in regional maritime security vis--vis the prospect of addressing the after effects of threats that become real.
In specific, with the Philippine situation, we have learned that prevention by propagating development initiatives helps to minimise, if not totally eradicate, the threats and the roots of such threats. In the Philippines it is our policy to address the physical manifestations of the threat, but alongside this we put equal importance in addressing the conditions that goes and sustain its existence. It is in this context that president Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo issued the directive to eradicate terrorists and insurgents by 2010 to enable a psychologically and physically secure environment for economic growth.
It is in this posit of achieving the goals and objectives of this policy that we have activated the spectrum approach of roles for the defence forces. From a functional standpoint, the role of the defence forces in maritime law enforcement operations in particular involves deterrence, detection and inter-detection. We now apply our traditional capabilities for expanded roles in law enforcement and national development. That is why the policy of the Philippines Department of National Defence is now anchored on defence for development.
Using the synergy of military might and Government means we are eliminating the threats on land and on sea and bringing basic health, education and infrastructure to more communities in simultaneous efforts. This agenda puts defence in a leading role in the Governments campaign to permanently rid the country of insurgence and terrorists by pouring development efforts in the countryside preventing this wretch from taking root.
The first point of development sets the framework for lasting solutions, insurgency, poverty and illiteracy in our country, and the same framework can provide a lasting solution to piracy, terrorism and other security threats in our waterways and our region.
The basics of this framework were put to the test in the Philippines in what is now known as oplan ultimatum. The world witnessed the fall of the elusive leaders of the Abu Sayyaf group and several military encounters in the island of Lore in southern Philippines. What the world did not see were the operations that applied the combination of hard and soft approaches towards terrorism. The critical task was to win the confidence of the people long assailed by conflict in the law, sustained civil military operations and humanitarian assistance projects were undertaken to address the roots of the conflict.
