According to the APEC Summit Organizing Council, all the 21 Asia-Pacific Economic Leaders are confirmed to attend the 2015 summit in Manila unless they give official notice that they are not coming.
“They are all coming as far as we know, unless they write to us officially that they are not. So the expectation is all of the leaders are coming,” said Ambassador Marciano Paynor Jr., director general of the APEC 2015 National Organizing Council.
So far there are two heads of state who sent notice that they won’t be able to attend. They are Russian President Vladimir Putin and Indonesian President Joko Widodo.
Putin did not say why he isn’t coming, though he advised that he will be sending Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev instead.
In the case of Widodo, Foreign Affairs Undersecretary Laura del Rosario disclosed that the Indonesian president won’t be attending because of some domestic concerns he needs to attend to.
“I just got a verbal message that there are things in Jakarta that need the attention of Pres. Widodo,” Del Rosario said, citing domestic concerns as reason for Widodo’s sudden non-attendance.
Paynor said two-thirds of the whole efforts go to security as the risk of securing the participants is 10 times more than it was 18 years ago when the first summit was held in Subic Bay.
For the convenience of APEC participants, Philippine President Benigno Aquino III declared 17–20 November as school holidays and 18–19 November as special non-working days in Metro Manila.
The holidays are intended to reduce traffic in Metro Manila for the duration of the week-long event. Organizers say the fewer people out in the streets during the leaders summit, the easier for them to secure the participants particularly the heads of governments of the 21-member organization.
Security will be particularly tight in the PICC area where the APEC Economic Leaders’ Meeting will take place.
As part of security precautions, building owners along Roxas Boulevard and adjacent areas where the delegates will pass will be asked to close their windows during the event.
“Part of how we can secure leaders as they go or traverse Roxas Boulevard from their hotels coming into PICC is to have windows closed. This is a basic security practice worldwide. In New York, when the UN General Assembly commences in end of September towards October, they request all skyscrapers along Manhattan routes going to the UN to have their windows closed. That is a basic practice,” Paynor told reporters
“There is no doubt that many of us will be inconvenienced but it is part of the hosting…They will not be able to move as freely as they are used to,” he added.
US President Barack Obama, Chinese president Xi Jinping, Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe are among the key leaders of the 21-nation economic body who will participate in the 2015 APEC Economic Leaders’ Meeting.
