Why the Syria and Egypt Situation is Important for Me and for Filipinos

A lot of you may be wondering why I keep writing about the situations related to Syria and Egypt. Why does it matter what a Filipino in the Philippines thinks about what is going on half a world away? To answer that, I would have to present statistical facts.

"Remittances continue to be the country’s main economic growth driver, equivalent to 10 percent of GDP."

(Malaya Business Insight, May 16, 2013)

• The Middle East as a region is where millions of overseas Filipinos are working. They are also known as OFWs.(Source: Country Migration Report Philippines 2013, International Organization for Migration)
• Saudia Arabia - 1,550,572 Filipinos
• UAE - 679,819 Filipinos
• Qatar - 342,442 Filipinos
• Kuwait - 186,750 Filipinos
• Overseas Filipino Remittances (Source: Country Migration Report Philippines 2013, International Organization for Migration, p. 115)
• Saudi Arabia - $1,613,237,000 (USD)
• UAE - $877, 981,000 (USD)

Related Material

• OFW inflows surge to 6 month high (Philstar.com, August 16, 2013)

According to the BSP, about three-fourths of cash remittances came from the United States, Saudi Arabia, the United Kingdom, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Canada, Singapore and Japan.

Saudi Arabia is one of the top three countries where Filipinos are "deployed" in. It is a full 1,956 km away from Syria and 1,611 km away from Iraq. Now we go back to the statements made a few days ago by Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Abbas Araqchi

"We want to strongly warn against any military attack in Syria. There will definitely be perilous consequences for the region,"

"These complications and consequences will not be restricted to Syria. It will engulf the whole region."      

As of 6:21 AM EST, I still cannot access the New York Times website because it was allegedly hacked by the Syrian Electronic Army. However my Google News feed picked this sobering title up,

"Strike on Syria Would Cause One on Israel, Iran Declares" 

(Google News link to New York Times, August 28 2013 or This Nonfunctional NYTimes Link)

Lastly, a troubling connection to take note of:

"Saudis offer Russia secret oil deal if it drops Syria"

(Telegraph.co.uk, August 27, 2013)