Incoming storm cancels PM's ASEAN trip

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Friday called off the three-day visit to the Philippines from Monday after the Association of Southeast Asian Nations summit was postponed due to concerns over an incoming tropical storm.

However, external affairs ministry officials said the prime minister will go ahead with his trip to Japan from December 13 to 16. He was originally scheduled to fly to Tokyo from Cebu on December 13, but will now leave New Delhi on that date and return to the capital in the evening of December 16.

Dr Singh was to attend the fifth India-ASEAN Summit at Cebu on Tuesday and the second East Asia Summit the following day.

The Philippines announced on Friday that the annual ASEAN summit and the East Asia summit from December 11-13

had been postponed until early January because of the incoming storm.

"The Philippine government arrived at this decision in consultation with the governments of the leaders participating in the summit," Marciano Paynor, Secretary-General for the ASEAN Organising Committee, told media persons in Cebu.

Reports from Manila quoted forecasters as saying that the tropical storm, currently over the northwest Pacific Ocean, will land in the central Philippines on Saturday but will pass north of Cebu. It was earlier forecast to pass through the resort island.

Last week, Typhoon Durian swept through the central Philippines triggering landslides and floods that are feared to have killed over 1,000 people.