A United States official has assured a speedy processing of claims of thousands of Filipino soldiers who fought in World War II and stand to receive benefits from the American government. US Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric Shinseki personally gave the assurance to Philippine Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro Jr., who is now in the US for a five-day working visit that includes a meeting with his American counterpart, Robert Gates, in Pentagon on Wednesday (Thursday in Manila). “In his first major meeting on Tuesday (Wednesday in Manila), Teodoro received assurances from … Shinseki of US commitment to speed up the processing of claims of Filipino WWII veterans under the $198-million lump sum package provided for in the US Stimulus Package," a statement from the Department of National Defense (DND) read. As of September 1, the US Department of Veterans Affairs (DVA) has processed 8,900 of the 31,876 claims it has received. This translates to over $77 million awarded to eligible Filipino veterans – $15,000 each for the 3,138 Filipino veterans with US citizenship and $9,000 each for the 3,414 non-US citizens. The statement said Shinseki has informed Teodoro of his government’s plan to embark on an “extensive outreach program" for WWII veterans in the Philippines to meet the February 16, 2010 deadline for the submission of documentary requirements of claims. Teodoro meanwhile thanked Shinseki for the DVA’s grant-in-aid to the Veterans Memorial Medical Center (VMMC) amounting to $5.5M since 2003 and the scheduled delivery of MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) equipment amounting to $1M next year. According to the statement, Shinseki has accepted Teodoro’s offer to conduct a joint DND-DVA assessment of VMMC’s existing capabilities under the Philippine Defense Reform program. Aside from Shinseki, Teodoro had also met with Senator Daniel Inouye and Rep. Bob Filner of California, who pushed legislation giving benefits to Filipino veterans of WWII, at the US Congress. Teodoro’s meeting with Gates, their second since June, is expected to cover mutual security issues and strengthen the two countries’ partnership to defeat terrorists and extremists in southern Philippines and the Southeast Asian region. The DND statement said Teodoro and Gates are likely to reaffirm existing security relations between the two countries. Existing Philippine-US defense and security relations are covered by the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA), which legalizes the annual RP-US Balikatan Exercises, and the Mutual Defense Treaty. Critics of the VFA in the Philippines have asked the Supreme Court to nullify the controversial agreement following reports of “overstaying" American soldiers in Mindanao.
- GMANews.TV 
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