Ambassador Alistair MacDonald, European Union Ambassador to the Philippines, on Tuesday expressed how pleased he had been to have seen a smooth and generally trouble-free election yesterday.

MANILA, Philippines—The Church-based Parish Pastoral Council for Responsible Voting released its 5:15 a.m. tally with 67, 681 or 88.5 percent of all 76, 475 precincts nationwide have been counted.

The Philippines has lifted the ban on deploying au pairs to Switzerland, the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration said Monday.

Polytechnic University of the Philippines President Dante Guevarra on Monday said that the university has decided to forgive and drop the charges against five students who were detained by the Manila Police District for allegedly stealing chairs from the university during a protest action against tuition hikes.

Doctors, health workers, and students of the University of the Philippines-Philippine General Hospital staged a protest action during the flag-raising ceremony on Monday.

British-Filipinos in the United Kingdom have launched a website aimed at informing and enlightening Filipinos overseas and Filipino Internet users in the Philippines on issues concerning Philippine politics and the future of the Filipino electoral system.

Majority of private business leaders in the Philippines reported higher stress levels over the last year but they were a bit better off than most of overseas peers as the local stress barometer fell below global average for the first time in four years, based on the Grant Thornton International Business Report 2010.

The Armed Forces of the Philippines on Friday said the Supreme Court decision allowing President Macapagal-Arroyo to appoint the next Chief Justice has too little effect on its soldiers to compel them into another military adventurism.

The government has decided to proceed with a $13.1-million Italian contract that would supply the Armed Forces of the Philippines with 18 new training planes by yearend.

Don’t believe the hype. Learn from the past. The president of the influential Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines on Friday told voters not to believe the promises of candidates and to be more discerning in choosing the country’s next leaders.

The President of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) is not happy with the slow implementation of the 1976 Tripoli Agreement in the Philippines which he helped drafted in 1976 when he was still foreign affairs minister in Libya, to resolve the Moro conflict in Mindanao.

Newly appointed Armed Forces of the Philippines chief of staff General Delfin Bangit has given government troops two months to crush the Abu Sayyaf group in Sulu.

The power supply situation in Mindanao has begun to improve as the island grid registered a supply deficit of only 520 megawatts as of Wednesday morning, according to the National Grid Corp. of the Philippines.

A series of killings since the political massacre of 57 people in the southern Philippines last year has set the stage for the country’s most violent election in recent history, experts warn.

Now, the Armed Forces of the Philippines chief’s “mistahs” (classmates) at the Philippine Military Academy are backing calls to extend his term until after the crucial May elections.

Sixty-eight Filipinos in Haiti are now asking the Philippines to repatriate them after another powerful earthquake struck the impoverished Carribean nation Wednesday, according to the Department of Foreign Affairs.

MANILA, Philippines – Three siblings were found dead in their home in Pampanga early Tuesday, according to a radio report.

A farmers’ caravan on the way to Malacañang to press for genuine agrarian reform has been repeatedly delayed by military and police checkpoints, the spokesman of the Kilusan Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (Peasant Movement of the Philippines), said Sunday.

Brazilian Ambassador to the Philippines Alcides G.R. Prates went on a private visit to Negros Occidental but instead took the time to donate blood to a gravely ill lawyer despite his tight schedule.

The Philippines is to sign an “open skies” agreement with members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations in April, a pact that the Department of Tourism said would dramatically increase tourist arrivals in the country.