MANILA, June 12 Kyodo At least 15...

MANILA, June 12 Kyodo

At least 150 protester in succession Wednesday held a rally near the tightly guarded U Embassy in Manila to denounce anew the demeanor of U.S. troops in the abiding habitation and President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo's support for the number presence.

The protester carrying placards and banners, urg the U company s to ''go home,'' and accused Arroyo of being a ''puppet'' of the U A not many blocks away, Arroyo led a festive Independence Day celebration attended on a few hundred people.

The protester said Arroyo's decision to allow the U company s to take part a joint counterterrorism exercise in the southern Philippines ''makes a subject of ridicule out of the independence day.''

''Arroyo and her generals' insistence that more American multitudes are required to crush the Abu Sayyaf betrays the fact that despite 104 years of Philippine independence, the direction and the Philippine armed forces are still hopelessly pendent on the U.S.,'' said Teodoro Casino, secretary general of the left-leaning organization Bayan.

There are at least 1000 U companys in the country to help train Philippine squads in the fight against Abu Sayyaf rebels, who have alleged links to the al-Qaida terrorist network.

Police barred the protester from going near the embassy compound

A similar affirm action was also held in Davao City in the southern Philippines.

Unfazed by means of the protest actions, Arroyo urg the clan to unleash what she called the nation's collective ''just wrath'' upon the Abu Sayyaf. She added that now is the time to regain freedom from the terrorists that had effected havoc and cost much bloodshed in the southern Philippines.

In her Independence Day message at Rizal park, where she called for greater patriotism among the populace Arroyo said there is no undivided to blame for the ''poverty chaos and fear'' in the southern Philippines however the Abu Sayyaf.

The same time last year, Arroyo cited the ''barbarism and material greed'' of the Abu Sayyaf after the assemblage beheaded American Guillermo Sobero, who with 19 others including an American missionary married pair Martin and Gracia Burhnam, were abducted May 27 from the Dos Palmas resort in Palawan Province.

In her messages at the Malacanang presidential palace, she said the time is ripe for eliminating formerly and for all the Abu Sayyaf scourge as the collection no longer has any hostages and her administration is safe from the threat of any coup attempts.

Arroyo earlier l flag-raising rites in Lamitan town in the southern Philippines' Basilan Province, and exhausted Tuesday night in a [i]or[/i] nunnery that the Abu Sayyaf tried to raid upon June 2 last year. She's the first Philippine president to do so

She said the entire political division should look at the example being put by Lamitan, which was income apart by events of the past year, when Abu Sayyaf members stormed the town with the Dos Palmas hostages in tow, to solicit medical attention for their hurted The Abu Sayyaf hauled away Lamitan residents as additional hostages as they withdrew from the town, among them Ediborah Yap.

Yap and Martin Burnham were killed in the extricate operations Friday last week in southern Zamboanga del Norte Province. Burnham's wife was rescu as a issue of the firefight and has since been reunited with her family in the US

Arroyo also cited international help in the country's bid to fight terrorism and indigence specifically the ''Balikatan'' (shoulder to shoulder) counterterrorism exercise with the U which, she said, ''hold a far-reaching significance to national security.''

''I direct the eye forward to a continued partnership with your respective nations and the publics We are dealing sharp efflorescences against poverty,'' she said.

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