The United States government has praised the expertise of Filipino construction workers in building the prison cells of arrested Al Qaida members brought to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Sources said using Filipino welders, fabricators and carpenters for the making of the prison cells in Cuba was part of the cooperation between the U.S. and the Philippines in the war on terrorism.

Manila processed and approved the travel and working papers of several skilled labourers picked for the job in less than 24 hours, a process that takes an average of two to three months.

Sources said the U.S. company, Brown and Root, a Houston-based subsidiary of Haliburton, hired 199 Filipinos to work in Cuba earlier this year. The travel papers of the recruited overseas Filipino workers were facilitated when the U.S. embassy called on the Philippines Overseas Emp-loyment Administration.

They said all the recruited workers were flown directly to Guantanamo on a chartered Greece- registered Electra Airlines DC-10, with refuelling stops in Dubai, Greece and Portugal.