Inquirer.net

MANILA, Philippines--It has been a record-breaking year for the Metro Manila Film Festival. Total earnings for the two-week festival, which started on Dec. 25 last year and ended on Wednesday reached an all-time high of P450 million, making the 34th staging the biggest grossing MMFF ever.

The government generated $1.5 billion from sale of 10-year bonds in the international capital market Thursday morning, completing its foreign commercial borrowing requirement for 2009.

Chairman Vicente Sotto of the Dangerous Drugs Board, a former senator, has used the controversy involving the “Alabang Boys” to push for two reforms. The first is passage of a law authorizing the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) to have its own prosecutorial service. The second is reimposition of the death penalty.

MANILA, Philippines—A complaint for the disbarment of the lawyer of two of the three drug suspects known as the “Alabang Boys” was filed by a crime watch group in the Supreme Court Thursday.

MANILA, Philippines—Struggling for most of the conference and ranged against teams with better records, Toyota Otis and Burger King pulled off a couple of upsets Thursday in the PBL PG Flex Linoleum Cup at the Ynares Sports Arena in Pasig City.

MANILA, Philippines—The “It” bag will become a source of embarrassment, a luxury industry analyst and consultant predicted in a luxury conference in London in November. Not only will it signify that “you don’t have your own view of fashion.” The analyst, according to Women’s Wear Daily, also referred to a phenomenon called “luxury fatigue” and consumers’ growing fear of incurring debt.

MANILA, Philippines -- Amid a looming economic slowdown in the Philippines for 2009, the business process outsourcing (BPO) industry is expected to remain strong.

MANILA, Philippines -- (UPDATE 2) The third attempt to get Filipinos in Gaza out of the war-torn territory was successful, with the 17 who chose to leave reaching the Gaza-Israel border, the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) said Thursday.