Palace: No Chinese demand for apology

Maybe he got it from WikiLeaks?

Presidential spokesman Edwin Lacierda on Thursday quipped that Inquirer columnist Rigoberto Tiglao may have gotten his information from the online whistleblower as he denied Tiglao’s claim that Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao had demanded an apology from President Aquino for the August 2010 hostage killings at the Luneta during the latter’s state visit to China last week.

According to Lacierda, there was no suggestion or demand for an apology at the September 1 meeting with Wen during Aquino’s five-day visit.

“If I remember, the Premier mentioned only the circumstances of the hostage taking incident. But I don’t think (Wen) demanded that the President should apologize,” he said.

Lacierda said the botched hostage rescue attempt that resulted in the deaths of eight Hong Kong tourists in Manila over a year ago was discussed only “in passing” during their meeting.

Lacierda recalled that Aquino told Wen that the Philippine government had taken appropriate actions and “(the President) also repeated that we regret the incident.”

Lacierda said the two leaders then moved on to other topics.

In his column, Tiglao quoted diplomatic sources as saying that Wen had demanded an apology—“though stated in a roundabout way”—from Aquino who was “caught flatfooted as his foreign affairs officials had said they were sure the issue was a ‘dead one.’”

Lacierda said the Chinese government hosted a state banquet for Aquino right after a bilateral meeting with Chinese President Hu Jintao and after witnessing the signing of agreements.