The Philippine Congress has approved a bill awarding compensation to thousands of victims of human rights abuses under late President Ferdinand Marcos' 20-year iron rule.

U.N. leader Ban Ki-moon on Tuesday called for an “amicable” settlement to a mounting South China Sea territorial dispute between China and other Asian nations.

A Canadian involved in legal rows with his neighbors shot dead two people Tuesday in a courtroom rampage in the central Philippines before killing himself, police said.

The Philippines has taken China to a U.N. tribunal to challenge its claim to most of the South China Sea, including territory belonging to the archipelago, Foreign Secretary Albert del Rosario said Tuesday.

The Philippines said Sunday that 52 of its nationals caught up in the Algerian hostage crisis had been accounted for, but it was still not known whether any Filipinos were among the dead.

All 79 officers and crew of a U.S. Navy minesweeper stuck on a coral reef in the central Philippines have left the ship two days after efforts to free the vessel failed, the Navy said Saturday.

A ban on carrying firearms went into force in the Philippines Sunday before local elections, amid growing debate about the need for stricter controls following a series of shooting deaths.

Philippine President Benigno Aquino may continue to carry a gun despite an impending ban on bearing firearms in the run-up to polls, an election official said Saturday.

The Philippine government plans to move about 100,000 squatters from their homes on crucial waterways in Manila by June as a flood control measure and for their own safety, an official said Saturday.

A fire swept through a hotel in a Philippine resort city early Friday, killing seven people, including three Americans, three Filipinos and a South Korean, authorities said.