NEWS AT A GLANCE

Free woman political prisoner and her sick baby, HR group urges

Malaybalay, Bukidnon – Human rights alliance Karapatan renewed its call for the immediate release of Zenaida Llesis and her baby girl on humanitarian grounds.

Llesis gave birth while under detention at the Bukidnon Detention and Rehabilitation Center. Llesis is a suspected member of the New People’s Army (NPA) but has been charged with common crimes.  She is now a nursing mother to her sick baby. 

Baby girl Llesis was only 14 days old when she was diagnosed as suffering from a congenital heart disease. A complex mass has also grown in the left lobe of her liver. The baby has lived in the detention cell with her mother since birth.

Karapatan noted that a platoon-size of plainclothesmen believed to be under the 803rd Brigade of the Philippine Army is usually seen roaming within the hospital premises. According to Karapatan, the soldiers said they were not concerned with the baby’s illness but rather with the possibility of the mother escaping.

Forty year-old Zenaida was three months pregnant when she was arrested on August 5 last year.  She was suffering from vaginal bleeding because of sensitive pregnancy and was resting in a private residence at Rocky Village in Pangantucan, Bukidnon when elements of the 8th Infantry Battalion under Lt. Col. Glenn Macasero arrested her reportedly without warrant.  

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But convicted killers are released

Norberto and Edilberto Manero were granted pardon under the Estrada presidency and have now been released under President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. Norberto Manero was responsible for the killing of Italian priest Fr. Tullio Favali.

“Why release the brutal killers of Fr. Tullio Favali while hundreds of victims of warrantless arrest remain languishing in jail?” asked Fr. Allan Jose Arcebuche, spokesperson of Promotion of Church People’s Response (PCPR).

“We remind President Arroyo that Donato Continente, wrongly convicted of killing US Col. James Rowe and all other political prisoners from the time of the Marcos dictatorship certainly deserve immediate and unconditional freedom! Likewise, freedom for the Mamburao detainees – poor farmers who have been unjustly imprisoned for the death of the Quintos brothers in Occidental Mindoro, among other innocent Filipinos, is long overdue,” said Arcebuche.

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OFWs join Asia-wide boycott campaign against Nestle

Filipinos in Asia-Pacific are enraged over reported rights violations by the Nestle Philippines management against its workers in the Philippines. Thus said the Asia Pacific Mission for Migrants (APMM), a Hong Kong based OFW group, as news of violent dispersal of Nestle striking workers in Cabuyao, Laguna reached its office.

Nestle workers under the United Filipro Employees (UFE) went on strike on Jan. 14, 2001 after the company refused to include retirement benefits in their Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA). The National Labor Reconciliation Commission, Supreme Court and the Court of Appeals have all rendered favorable decisions for the workers and ordered the Nestle management to negotiate with their employees.

However, the management has refused to heed the orders. The Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE), meanwhile, remains silent over the issue.

Ramon Bultron, APMM managing director said,“The Nestle greed is astounding. With a profit of P8.76 million last year, they are still tightfisted with giving the workers their just demand. This giant food company is starving its own employees,” Bultron furthered.

Bultron reported that APMM is planning to conduct an Asia-wide solidarity campaign for the beleaguered Nestle workers. He said that the group is set to coordinate with Filipinos abroad in order to push the Nestle Philippines management to heed the demand of their workers to go back to the negotiating table.

Among the major actions that they are planning to conduct are protest actions in Nestle offices in various countries and joint statements to be signed by multi-sectoral organizations and workers unions, Bultron announced. 

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Salamat not part of negotiating panel, MILF insists

The Moro Islamic Liberation Front belied the statement from Malacañang that MILF Chairman Salamat Hashim is one of the five rebel negotiators for peace talks with the Macapagal-Arroyo government.

In a statement, MILF Central Committee said Hashim will not serve in the MILF negotiating panel until the final stretch of the talks in order to sign the final peace agreement with the Arroyo government.

Last week Malaysian Ambassador Taufik said the negotiations, to be hosted by Malaysia, "could start within days," after the two sides reached conditions "conducive" to restarting talks following informal
meetings.

Malaysia is a member of the influential Organization of Islamic Conference which has been helping to broker a peace deal with the MILF.

The Malaysian ambassador also urged Malacañang to drop the arrest warrants on Hashim and company.  But President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo rejected the request, saying the law should not be used as a "bargaining chip."

Meanwhile, the Moro Christian People’s Alliance (MCPA) expressed  alarm over the United States’ participation in the peace talks. 

“The first and most obvious U.S. interest in ‘participating’ in the peace talks is to push the widely-opposed Balikatan 03-1 which is slated in Sulu. Secondly, Mindanao, which President Macapagal-Arroyo fondly calls as ‘land of promise,’ is a potential U.S. naval and air base camp. As the U.S. continuously expands its military might and influence, it needs to secure Mindanao as its military base in South East Asia. The U.S. will not fund General Santos airport’s construction out of goodwill. U.S. interests in Mindanao are glaring at us in the open,” Amirah Ali Lidasan, MCPA secretary general, noted. 

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CPP, NPA unfazed by Arroyo's "counterattacks"

The Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) said it is unfazed by the "political, diplomatic and military counterattacks" that President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo ordered against the revolutionary movement in the face of recent successful tactical offensives of the New People's Army (NPA) in Samar and Compostela Valley.

Government troops sustained many casualties in the assaults: 18 killed in Samar and 13 in Davao del Norte.

In a press statement, CPP spokesman Gregorio "Ka Roger" Rosal belittled the order from Macapagal-Arroyo to redeploy Armed Forces troops from Mindanao to NPA areas.

Rosal said, "Deploying more AFP troops in NPA guerrilla zones also means more targets of NPA tactical offensives and thus more weapons to arm the growing number of NPA Red fighters."

Rosal also recently urged NPA local commands to "emulate the Red fighters in Samar and Compostela Valley and carry out more and bigger tactical offensives against the hated fascist troops of the AFP."

He further dismissed President Arroyo's statement calling the recent NPA offensives as "terrorist acts" saying that "Arroyo has become so blinded with her 'terrorist syndrome' that she cannot even distinguish between revolutionary military actions and acts of terrorism."

Bulatlat.com

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