APROPOS to the headline topic, a warm welcome to career diplomat Enrique Manalo as secretary of the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA). In today's intensely fractious and dizzyingly complex geopolitical and geoeconomic environment, Secretary Manalo's decades of expertise and experience are indispensable in assessing global issues and developments and crafting finely nuanced responses that effectively advance national interests across the broad spectrum of international affairs.

To use a movie metaphor, the DFA now has a Jedi master of diplomacy at the helm.