An influential organization of Roman Catholic bishops...

An influential organization of Roman Catholic bishops urged the Philippine government to blacklist Saudi Arabia as a work destination over the scheduled beheadings of Filipinos convicted by Islamic courts there. Bishop Ramon Arguelles, head of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines' Episcopal Commission on Migrants and Itinerant People, made the call after a Saudi court sentenced Primo Gasmen, a 32-year-old Filipino worker, to die in January for the murder of Nepalese Kim Bahadur Gurung. Four other Filipinos ? Sergio Aldana, Antonio Alvesa, Wilfredo Bautista and Miguel Fernandez ? were convicted in the murder of fellow Filipino Jaime dela Cruz. Their execution date was not clear. "We deploy Filipinos in 193 countries in the world and I am not asking that we blacklist all of them," Arguelles said. "I have long suggested implementing selective deployment by blacklisting receiving countries where a number of Filipinos have been maltreated and even in places where they are still imposing capital punishment." But Labor Secretary Patricia Santo Tomas said it was not easy to blacklist Saudi Arabia, considering 500,000 Filipinos are working there. "When you implement selective deployment, expect that it will affect a whole range of aspects like diplomatic ties. There are risks in doing that," she pointed out, while adding that the problem of labour "should be left to the sound judgment of the people on the ground".