By Robina Asido

United States Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin will be arriving on July 29 for talks related to Visiting Forces Agreement, Mutual Defense Treaty, US and Philippine bilateral relations and West Philippine Sea issues.

This was announced by Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana in the virtual pre-State of the Nation Address on Wednesday.

"(On) the visit of (Secretary) Lloyd Austin on 29-30, we do not yet have agenda for the meeting. It is still being discussed by our staffs, but I expect that we will discuss the VFA (Visiting Forces Agreeement), MDT (Mutual Defense Treaty), the bilateral relationship with US and fourth is the West Philippines Sea or the South China Sea, I expect that we will discuss these four topics," he said.

Lorenzana also mentioned that the Office of the President is studying the side agreement made by the VFA Commission for the implementation of the visiting forces deal with the United States.

"The VFA document will not be changed but there will be some addendum side agreement to implement the VFA. Now this document that was made by the VFA Commission is there in Malacanang and it is being studied by the Office of the President," he said.

"There is side agreement to implement the provisions of the VFA and once it is signed by the president then that will be an official document attached to the VFA," he added. DMS