Lacson: Philippines can look elsewhere if US stops rifles sale

MANILA, Philippines --  The Philippines did not lose anything after the US State Department reportedly stopped the planned sale of about 26,000 rifles to the Philippine National Police because it can get guns elsewhere, Sen.Panfilo Lacson said Tuesday.

"There are tens of other countries that manufacture better and probably cheaper assault rifles than the US," Lacson, a former PNP chief, said in a statement.

The decision was made after US Sen. Ben Cardin, the top Democrat on the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said he would oppose the planned sale because of concerns over alleged human rights violations in the Philippines.

Lacson said that since he has yet to see an investigation on the perceived rise in drug-related killings in the Philippines, he will take Cardin's statement as "his own opinion and nothing more."

He added the Department of National Defense has even more reason to revive the country's self-reliance program to produce its own weapons and ammunition.

Duterte, who sees US concerns over human rights as interference in Philippine affairs, has said in the past that he is considering buying weapons and equipment from Russia and China instead of from the US, which has been the primary supplier of the equipment of the Armed Forces of the Philippines. 

The president said that China and Russia, whose "ideological flow" he said he is joining, offered soft loans payable in 2025.

"We can buy the arms where they are cheap and where there are no strings attached and it is transparent," Duterte said.