MANILA, Philippines?(UPDATE) Nationalist People's Coalition senatorial candidate Vicente Sotto III has warned against exposing the names of politicians suspected of drug links, saying this will jeopardize any ongoing fact-finding efforts of the government.

Sotto said the watch list was a confidential document collated by the Dangerous Drugs Board, which he used to head, and was sourced from monitoring reports of the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency, National Bureau of Investigation, and Philippine National Police.

Sotto said the US State Department did not have a copy. He said that aside from the PDEA and NBI, a copy of the document was also given to the Office of the President and the Bureau of Internal Revenue.

Sotto said President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has instructed the BIR and the Anti-Money Laundering Council to monitor those in the list.

He assured the people that the watch list did not contain the names of any presidential, vice presidential, or senatorial candidate suspected of drug dealing or receiving funds from drug lords.

He added, however, that names of elected local officials were included in the list, which is dominated by private individuals either because they were in areas notorious for drug dealing or were users themselves.

He asked officials reacting to the Philippine Daily Inquirer story not to train their guns on the PDEA or the US State Department since the story was just a part of what was highlighted from the DDB document.