We, Filipinos in Europe are extending our deepest and sincerest thanks to Indonesian President Joko Widodo for sparing Mary Jane Veloso from today’s execution. Yes, she was reprieved but we believe that she is innocent and all she wants was to find a job to support her two young boys (6 and 12 years old) and give them a better future. She must be given full freedom and go home. Thank you Mr. President for being reasonable and wise. You are a strong and tough leader but compassionate for the deserving ones. We hope, the Philippines will have someone like you.

David Walker, bishop of Manchester, says it is unworthy for politicians to label displaced migrants as criminals, and country should take in fair share, urging the leaders to look on migrants with compassion, that Britain has a moral duty to accept refugees from conflicts in which it has participated. The death toll of migrants attempting to cross the Mediterranean into Europe last week grew to 1,700.  He said, he wants his country United Kingdom, to be governed by those who are prepared to look at the faces of the desperate, be it the desperation of the asylum seeker or of the food bank client, and to look at them with compassion. Despite the huge numbers of migrants heading north, only 5,000 resettlement places across Europe have been offered to refugees under an emergency summit crisis package agreed by EU leaders, with the rest sent back as irregular migrants under a new rapid-return programme coordinated by the EU’s border agency, Frontex.