MANILA – Following the arrest of a Chinese national allegedly engaged in espionage and two of his Filipino cohorts, Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) chief Gen. Romeo Brawner Jr. on Monday said security in all military camps and facilities nationwide will be further tightened.
In a media briefing held at the Department of Justice in Manila, Brawner said the military has already beefed up security at its camps, with strict checking of individuals entering AFP compounds and installations.
Initial reports said a Chinese national and his two Filipino accomplices, using a sports utility vehicle loaded with devices for espionage, conducted surveillance operations in key civilian and military installations.
National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) Office of the Cybercrime Division chief Jeremy Lotoc identified the three as Chinese national Deng Yuanqing, and Filipinos Ronel Jojo Balundo Besa and Jason Amado Fernandez.
“Itong nahuli po natin ay isa siyang (The one we apprehended is a) specialist in terms of control engineering and the automation and engineering discipline,” Lotoc said of the arrested Chinese during the media briefing.
“He is a technical software engineer affiiiated with PLAUST, which is controlled and operated by the People’s Liberation Army, with address in Nanjing, Jiangsu in China,” he added, referring to the People’s Liberation Army University of Science and Technology.
The three were arrested in front of a Makati City condominium night of January 17.
“We have to make sure that our camps are (secured), hindi lang po yung mga kampo (not only in our camps) but even vital installations. So, aside from being very strict inside the camps, we are also monitoring the periphery of our camps, dahil napansin po natin katulad dun sa mga EDCA (Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement) sites natin ay bigla na lang may tumatayong mga POGO (Philippine Offshore Gaming Operators) sa katabing area nung mga EDCA sites natin (we noticed, like in our EDCA sites, POGO establishments suddenly start operations),” Brawner said.
Brawner revealed that a Chinese was also arrested last year with possible espionage equipment.
“We are still conducting also the forensics on the equipment but initially what we saw in the equipment were pictures of camps, pictures ng (of) Fort Bonifacio, pictures (of) Camp Aguinaldo, picture (of) Camp Crame and so on. Tinitingnan po natin lahat ng koneksyon nitong mga ito from the RAV-4 na nakuha po natin ngayon (we are looking at all possible connections with the RAV-4 we intercepted),” he added.
Fort Bonifacio in Taguig City is the headquarters of the Philippine Army, and Camp Aguinaldo of the AFP and Camp Crame of the Philippine National Police, located across each other in EDSA, Quezon City.
For his part, NBI Director Jaime Santiago said follow-up operations are ongoing to track down other members of the group. (PNA)