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\n Interior Secretary Jonvic Remulla is the featured guest during the Kapihan ng Samahang Plaridel in Manila on May 8, 2026. Remulla expressed confidence that authorities would still be able to arrest former congressman Zaldy Co despite his application for political asylum in France. Officials are currently awaiting the issuance of an Interpol red notice against the former lawmaker. PHOTOS BY RENE DILAN\n <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n \n Interior Secretary Jonvic Remulla is the featured guest during the Kapihan ng Samahang Plaridel in Manila on May 8, 2026. Remulla expressed confidence that authorities would still be able to arrest former congressman Zaldy Co despite his application for political asylum in France. Officials are currently awaiting the issuance of an Interpol red notice against the former lawmaker. PHOTOS BY RENE DILAN\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n \n Interior Secretary Jonvic Remulla is the featured guest during the Kapihan ng Samahang Plaridel in Manila on May 8, 2026. Remulla expressed confidence that authorities would still be able to arrest former congressman Zaldy Co despite his application for political asylum in France. Officials are currently awaiting the issuance of an Interpol red notice against the former lawmaker. PHOTOS BY RENE DILAN\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n \n Interior Secretary Jonvic Remulla is the featured guest during the Kapihan ng Samahang Plaridel in Manila on May 8, 2026. Remulla expressed confidence that authorities would still be able to arrest former congressman Zaldy Co despite his application for political asylum in France. Officials are currently awaiting the issuance of an Interpol red notice against the former lawmaker. PHOTOS BY RENE DILAN\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n \n Interior Secretary Jonvic Remulla is the featured guest during the Kapihan ng Samahang Plaridel in Manila on May 8, 2026. Remulla expressed confidence that authorities would still be able to arrest former congressman Zaldy Co despite his application for political asylum in France. Officials are currently awaiting the issuance of an Interpol red notice against the former lawmaker. PHOTOS BY RENE DILAN\n <\/p>\n Get the latest news Sign up for The Manila Times newsletters<\/p>\n By signing up with an email address, I acknowledge that I have read and agree to the Terms of Service<\/a> and Privacy Policy<\/a>.<\/p>\n He said Co applied for political asylum in France last week.<\/p>\n \u201cYou can only file [for asylum] once. For [former presidential spokesman] Harry Roque, he only applied in Vienna. You cannot apply again in another place. So he can only apply in France,\u201d Remulla said.<\/p>\n Philippine and French authorities are already in communication regarding Co\u2019s asylum bid.<\/p>\n \u201cThere are conversations going on to that effect,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n The disclosure on Co\u2019s whereabouts and asylum application came as Remulla confirmed that the Philippine government\u2019s request for an International Criminal Police Organization (Interpol) Red Notice against the former lawmaker remains pending six months after it was filed.<\/p>\n He said the request was submitted in September through the Presidential Commission for Transnational Crimes, but Interpol has yet to act on it.<\/p>\n \u201cIt turns out that the laws in the Philippines and Interpol are different. As long as there is even a slight political inclination, they delay it,\u201d Remulla said.<\/p>\n Despite the delay, he is confident the notice would eventually be issued.<\/p>\n Remulla also detailed Co\u2019s earlier movements in Europe, confirming that he was detained for 36 hours at the border of the Czech Republic and Germany.<\/p>\n He said he personally informed President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. of the incident, that Co was stopped by immigration authorities while attempting to enter Germany, and was brought to Prague.<\/p>\n \u201cHe was detained for 36 hours. I was the one who informed the President of his capture. The DFA (Department of Foreign Affairs) and DOJ (Department of Justice) took the lead,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Remulla said Co presented an expired Philippine passport during the incident, contrary to earlier speculation that he had used a Portuguese passport.<\/p>\n He added that government counsel was already en route to Prague when Co was released following court proceedings with a lawyer he had hired.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was an immigration violation because his passport had already expired,\u201d Remulla said.<\/p>\n He said efforts to secure Co\u2019s return are ongoing, including diplomatic coordination and continued engagement with Interpol.<\/p>\n \u201cIf I could just kneel in front of Interpol to get the Red Notice, I would do it. I\u2019ve already spoken with the vice president of Interpol, the chairman has not yet. We\u2019re trying our best,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n He said the Red Notice remains key to bringing Co back to the Philippines and dismissed concerns that the asylum application could derail efforts.<\/p>\n \u201cLet\u2019s prioritize the Red Notice first. We will get him before his asylum application is finished. I am confident that before it is completed, we will already have Zaldy,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n In a Messenger chat to The Manila Times on Friday, Kiko Aquino-Dee, a co-convenor of Tindig Pilipinas and one of the organizers of the Trillion Pesos March last year, said Co\u2019s bid for asylum in France \u201cweakens\u201d the credibility of the Marcos administration.<\/p>\n \u201cIt seems too much of a coincidence to me that his escape came soon after Martin Romualdez\u2019s implied threat to implicate the current administration in the flood control scam. Did his implied threat work?\u201d Aquino-Dee said.\u200b<\/p>\n \u201cRegardless, his (Co\u2019s) escape I think further weakens the administration\u2019s credibility on anti-corruption, and the only way for them to recover would still be to make sure that he comes home safely and testifies freely on the flood control scam,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"RESIGNED congressman Elizaldy \u201cZaldy\u201d Co is staying in an upscale property in Paris, as he seeks political asylum…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":13104,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[9821,9823,689,30,9820,9822],"class_list":{"0":"post-13103","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-paris","8":"tag-co","9":"tag-district","10":"tag-in","11":"tag-paris","12":"tag-remulla","13":"tag-upscale"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13103","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13103"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13103\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13104"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13103"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13103"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13103"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
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