President Obama cancels meeting with Filipono counterpart following insult
According to NDTV, the meeting, the first ever between the two presidents, was cancelled after Duterte described Obama as a "son of a bitch" at a press conference on Monday.
Duterte was travelling to Laos to attend the annual summit of Southeast Asian leaders.
At a news conference, President Obama said he had told his aides to speak with Philippine officials "to find out is this, in fact, a time where we can have some constructive, productive conversations," reported NDTV.
Obama is now likely to meet South Korean President Park Geun-hye on Tuesday, according to Ned Price, spokesman for the White House National Security Council.
According to media reports, the Filipino President expressed regret on Tuesday for his abusive remark while referring to President Barack Obama.
The Hindu quoted a statement read out by Duterte's spokesman, where Duterte said his “strong comments” to certain questions by a reporter “elicited concern and distress, we also regret it came across as a personal attack on the U.S. President.”
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