The Philippine government will not impose a ban on the deployment of workers to Afghanistan despite the abduction of a Filipino diplomat, who has since been freed unharmed, an official said Friday. Foreign Undersecretary Jose Brillantes said that at the moment, there was no need to impose a ban on Filipino workers for private corporations, non-government organizations and international agencies based in Afghanistan. "I don't feel the necessity of imposing a ban in Afghanistan," he said, one day after Filipino diplomat Angelito Nayan, 34, returned home after 26 days in captivity in Afghanistan. "The Filipinos there are all well secured." Brillantes, however, cautioned the 327 Filipinos in Afghanistan to limit their movements and avoid unnecessary travel to ensure their safety. He added that the Department of Foreign Affairs "will regularly review its position on a deployment ban and will reconsider imposition if the situation so requires". Nayan and his two U.N. colleagues - British-Irish Annetta Flanigan and Kosovar Shiqpe Hebibi - were abducted at gunpoint near their office in Kabul on October 28. Their abductors, belonging to the Jaishul Muslimeen (Army of Muslims), a breakway Taliban group, had demanded the U.N. and foreign forces to leave Afghanistan and the United States to free all Taliban prisoners. --more 1443 Local Time 1143 GMT
