London, 26 January 2016 – Ambassador to the Court of St. James’s Enrique Manalo meets with the members of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on the Philippines (APPG-Philippines) at the Houses of Parliament in Westminster, upon the invitation of its Chair, Sir David Amess MP. Sir David has been the Chair of APPG-Philippines since 2014.

All-Party Groups (APGs) are informal cross-party groups that have no official status within Parliament, but are run by and for Members of the Commons and Lords.

It was the first meeting of the APPG-Philippines for this year, the 70th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between the Philippines and the United Kingdom.

Both sides reiterated the long-standing cooperation and mutual respect that the PH and the UK have for each other and noted that bilateral relations between the two countries have expanded in many ways in the past few years.

Sir David expressed the hope for the APPG-Philippines members to visit the Philippines this year and reiterated their hope that a counterpart group in the Philippines could also be established in the PH. END