Iloilo City (CNN Philippines) — To secure the safety and peace in the area, more than 2,000 law enforcers will be deployed in connection with the first Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) meeting in Iloilo City July 23 to 24.
The two-day APEC meeting on “Strengthening the Capital Markets, Infrastructure Development and Financing” will be held at the Royal Garden Hall Convention Center along General Luna Street, City Proper.
Insp. Shella Mae A. Sangrines, spokesperson of the APEC 2015 Iloilo City Site-Task Group, said a “full alert status” will be declared on July 17 and an actual accounting and deployment of personnel will start on July 18.
“A series of activities are already lined-up prior to the actual deployment day such as table top exercises, simulation exercises of various scenarios, communication exercises to check all communication equipment, among others,” she said.
Sangrines said they decided to lessen the number of police and security personnel to be deployed in the APEC meeting based on the experiences in Bacolod City and Boracay Island, which also hosted separate APEC conferences in May.
More or less 4,000 police officers in Boracay while 3,000 were sent to Bacolod by the Philippine National Police.
“We hosted the APEC meeting in Bacolod for the first time and the challenge then was bigger because the hosting of Boracay depended on the success of the Bacolod leg,” she said.
