'No comment', says US embassy on coup plot

Oct 28, 2005
Updated 11:45am (Mla time)
Veronica Uy
INQ7.net

THE US embassy in Manila on Friday refused to comment on a US intelligence report linking former president Fidel Ramos to an alleged coup plot against President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.

Ruth Urry, information officer of the US embassy, said: “We have no reaction on the reports. We have a long -standing rule not to react to media reports citing supposed US classified documents from unnamed sources.”

Early on in the year, the US Embassy in Manila received information linking Ramos to reports of a supposed planned coup Arroyo, said a report of the Philippine Daily Inquirer.

According to an embassy report dated February 24, 2005, and prepared before the illegal numbers game “jueteng” and the wiretap scandals erupted, Ramos gave his former national security adviser, Jose Almonte, until June to implement the plan against the President.