Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte said Monday that U.S. special forces training Filipino troops in the southern Philippines against jihadist militants "have to go."
Duterte, who made headlines last week for profane comments about the United States and President Obama, argued that American military forces in the Philippines are valuable targets for Abu Sayyaf, an Islamist jihadist group linked to ISIS, Reuters reported.
"These special forces, they have to go," Duterte said on Monday during a ceremony for new officials. "I do not want a rift with America. But they have to go."
"Americans, they will really kill them, they will try to kidnap them to get ransom," Duterte said.
Duterte made headlines last week when he reportedly used a Tagalog phrase to refer to Obama as a "son of a bitch," leading the American president to cancel a planned meeting with the Filipino leader at the ASEAN Summit in Laos. Duterte later expressed regret over the comments, which he said were not directed at Obama. The two did briefly exchange "pleasantries" during the summit, Obama said at a press conference last week.
U.S special forces were deployed to the Philippines in 2002 on a train-and-advise mission to help local forces fight Abu Sayyaf. The program was discontinued last year but a small number of special forces remained to provide logistics and technical support.
The U.S. military has bolstered its presence in the Philippines as China has continued to make aggressive territorial moves in the South China Sea.