Nineteen Filipinos condemned to death for crimes committed in other countries have been spared from the gallows over the past two years, Philippines President Gloria Arroyo's office said Tuesday. Of the 52 Filipinos sentenced over the same period to capital punishment, 19 had their sentences commuted, the presidential palace said in a statement.
Six have been sent home from the Middle East while the seventh arrived here from Malaysia in August. The group are among some eight million Filipinos, some nine percent of the country's population, who work abroad. The government expects the overseas work force to remit a record 14 billion dollars in salaries back to the Philippines this year.