(Eagle News)– The Philippines on Friday expressed its sympathies to Papua New Guinea (PNG), which was struck by a 7.5-magnitude earthquake on February 26 and a 6.8-magnitude aftershock on March 7.
“We express our condolences to the government and people of (PNG) and pray that last night’s aftershock would be the last,” Foreign Affairs Secretary Alan Peter Cayetano said in a statement on Friday.
Cayetano made the statement days after President Rodrigo Duterte expressed solidarity to the country following the February earthquake that struck its Southern Highland Province.
Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel Piñol met with PNG Prime Minister Peter O’Neill to personally extend the President’s condolences, the DFA said.
The DFA said according to Ambassador Bienvenido Tejano, the private sector delegation also accompanied Secretary Manny Pinol, who pledged to donate 1,000 bags of rice and a 40-foot container of canned goods for the victims.
The DFA reported that no Filipino was killed in the separate incidents.
An estimated 36,000 Filipinos live in PNG and around 300 in the neighboring Solomon Islands, the DFA said.
