Arroyo Killings Worse than Marcos - Jalandoni

“By record numbers she is worse than Marcos,” said Luis Jalandoni, a former Catholic priest who is now the International Spokesperson of the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP). 

By Edwin C. Mercurio
Contributed to Bulatlat

TORONTO, CANADA - While Philippine President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo was lauded by Vatican for signing a law abolishing the death penalty last week, her administration is being blamed for the unsolved  political killings, which had reached 690 under her watch. The victims include judges, lawyers, priests, workers, peasants, anti-mining activists, journalists, doctors, teachers, union leaders, environmentalists and leaders of indigenous communities.

“By record numbers she is worse than Marcos,” said Luis Jalandoni, a former Catholic priest who is now the International Spokesperson of the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP). “The killings and assassinations continue with impunity under the Arroyo administration."

Under the Marcos Dictatorship, there were more than 1,500 victims of summary executions, and more than 700 victims of forced disappearance, over a span of 14 years.  Under Arroyo, the human rights alliance Karapatan has recorded 175 victims of forced disappearance as of June 27.

In a speech before a gathering of community leaders in Toronto, Jalandoni said that the murderous rampage of the regime of President Arroyo is directly linked to the “terrorist” listing of the Communist Party of the Philippines and its military arm, the New People’s Army (CPP-NPA).

The pattern is the same as Operation Phoenix in Vietnam, he said. Operation Phoenix was an assassination program undertaken by the CIA in Vietnam. The idea was to cripple the National Liberation Front (NLF) by killing influential people like mayors, teachers, doctors, tax collectors or anyone who aided the functioning of the NLF's parallel government in the South. Many of the suspects were tortured and some were tossed from helicopters during interrogation. William Colby, the CIA official in charge of Phoenix and who later became CIA director, insisted this was all part of "military necessity". More than 20,000 Vietnamese citizens were killed as part of Operation Phoenix.

The American magazine Counterspy describes the Phoenix Program as "the most indiscriminate and massive program of political murder since the Nazi death camps of World War II."

"The series of unsolved killings, arrests without warrants and inhuman torture of suspects in the Philippines are a drawback to Operation Phoenix and the era of McCarthyism in the U.S. where persons suspected of communist ties and listed under the "Philippine Military Order of Battle" are targeted for surveillance, assassination and political persecution", Jalandoni said.

Jalandoni also said that General Eduardo Ermita who served under Marcos in the 1980s and now the Executive Secretary of the Arroyo administration and John Negroponte, Operation Phoenix spy chief who visited RP last year, are instrumental in the spate of unsolved killings in the Philippines.

Negroponte as a US ambassador to Iraq is known to have implemented the "Salvadoran Option" where killings were blamed on Iraq's resistance.  Cause-oriented groups have accused Ermita of being one of the architects of murders and killings of political activists and opposition leaders during Marcos' martial law regime, and is said to be likewise behind the relentless killings of political leaders and activists under the Arroyo administration.

The "terrorist" listing of the CPP-NPA has also derailed the peace negotiations between the Manila government and the NDFP when the chief negotiator of the CPP-NPA professor Jose Maria Sison was included in the U.S. terrorist listing followed by the Dutch, British, Canadian, European Union and Australian governments.

Before the terrorist listing, Jalandoni said the peace negotiation was focused on the socio-economic reforms, human rights and respect for international humanitarian law and reforms to address the root causes of the armed conflict.

"After the terrorist listing, all they wanted is for the NDFP to surrender and sign a final peace agreement," Jalandoni said ."So, all those who want the resumption of the peace negotiation should exert all efforts to campaign and exert pressure to take Joma Sison and the CPP-NPA off the terrorist list." The NDFP is the umbrella organization of the CPP-NPA.

Liberation movements

Jalandoni also quoted the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) 2005 report which categorically stated “that the CPP-NPA are not terrorists.”

“The UNDP report declared that the CPP-NPA consists of liberation movements and as a matter of policy and practice, they do not attack civilians. The CPP-NPA are more on the tradition of liberation movements. In addition, the NDFP declares its adherence to the Geneva Convention and Protocols of 1991-1996. The NDFP's basic doctrines, policies, rules and continuing practice adheres and respects human rights and international humanitarian law. It treats its prisoners of war with humane treatment, releases them and testimonies from released prisoners of war state that they are treated well, So, we think that also is an important aspect to bring up in a formal peace talk."

In August 2005, the NDFP submitted a 10-point proposal “for a just peace”, hand-carried to the GRP panel in Oslo as well as to the Norwegian government. According to Jalandoni, "if the Philippine government is willing to sign the document, we could have an immediate truce, not a surrender, but the stopping of hostilities while reforms addressing the root causes of the armed conflict could be undertaken. But the Arroyo government has answered by declaring a kind of total war and has put all of us who are in the negotiating panel and consultants on the wanted list and charged with rebellion."

“As you can see, in RP as well as abroad there is a strong campaign to stop the killings, a call for the resumption of peace talks and the de-listing of the CPP-NPA and Professor Joma Sison.” Bulatlat

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