MANILA - Former Philippines president Fidel Ramos will seek to repair ties with Malaysia that were damanged over alleged mistreatment of illegal Filipino migrants, a presidential spokesman said Friday.

President Gloria Arroyo late Thursday said she would ask Ramos, regarded as a friend of Malaysian Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad, to go to Kuala Lumpur.

"I still do not have the specifics, but what I know is former president Fidel Ramos is very close to Prime Minister Mahathir," presidential spokesman Ignacio Bunye said over DZBB radio.

"His trip will open a lot of doors and hopefully will speed up the solution to this problem," Bunye said.

Manila filed a formal protest earlier this week after thousands of illegal migrants arrived in the southern Philippines in recent days after the Aug 1 implementation of tough Malaysian laws.

The laws included a six-month jail term and up to six strokes of the cane for those convicted of illegally staying in Malaysia.

Dead infants

Many of those sent back aboard Philippine naval vessels suffered from dehydration and respiratory infections, social workers said.

At least three infants died.

The plight of the migrants sparked outrage across the Philippines, with legislators calling for a congressional inquiry into allegations the Filipinos were subjected to severe punishment while in Malaysian holding centers.

Manila newspapers attacked Malaysia, with at least one, the widely-circulated Philippine Daily Inquirer likening the arrests to the "herding by the Nazis of Jews in their ghettoes prior to their being transported to concentration camps."

A picture of one deportee, a man named Majib Daji, was splashed in the paper's front page on Friday, with his bare back showing whip marks which he said were left by Malaysian authorities.

An angry Daji, 25, said he knew of at least five Filipinos who died in Malaysian holding centers, but this could not be independently confirmed.

Protests outside the Malaysian embassy also continued Friday, with the burning of a Malaysian flag.

Hundreds of Filipinos are believed awaiting deportation to the Philippines.

Up to half a million Filipinos live in Sabah, which Manila claims belonged to the Philippine archipelago through the Sultanate of Jolo in the south. In recent days Philippines legislators have called for renewing the claim. AFP