Filipino Torture Victims Testify Before UN
Day: May 16, 2009
A Rapu-Rapu Mother Grapples With the Poverty Caused by Mining
BY JANESS ANN ELLAO Bulatlat RAPU-RAPU ISLAND, Albay — Three decades ago, the Department of Sociology of the University of the Philippines provided interesting insights into the actual power of women. Its study showed that women from the lower classes have more say in decision-making and holds the purse strings compared to their counterparts from…
Afghanistan/Pakistan: Where Empires Go to Die
BY DR. WILLIAM J. LEON III Truthout INTERNATIONAL Posted by Bulatlat Under the pretext of responding to the September 11, 2001, attacks in America, the United States and Great Britain invaded Afghanistan on October 7, 2001. They dubbed this invasion Operation Enduring Freedom. President Bush 41 told the American people that the US strikes were,…
Consumers Vs. Oil Cartel: A New Round Starts
BY ARNOLD PADILLA Contributor Bulatlat MANILA –Oil firms, in particular the so-called Big Three, are again on the defensive. A trial court judge has ordered them to open their books of account for scrutiny. The order is meant to determine if the three oil firms operate as a cartel. Meanwhile, the Arroyo administration’s chief economist…
A Tale of Two Summits
Obama and Latin America: No Light, All Tunnel BY ROBERT SANDELS Counterpunch INTERNATIONAL Posted by Bulatlat The April summit appeared to be a grand success. No, not the one in Trinidad and Tobago; the one in Cumana, Venezuela, where Bolivian President Evo Morales said, “If we do not change capitalism, humanity will be at risk,…
Sison: AFP Chief ‘Daydreaming’ About Finishing Off NPA by 2010
By ALEXANDER MARTIN REMOLLINO Bulatlat MANILA – The chief political consultant of the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP), which has been engaged in on-and-off peace negotiations with the Government of the Republic of the Philippines (GRP) since 1986, has derided new Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) chief of staff Lt. Gen. Victor…
Little Known Military Thug Squad Still Brutalizing Prisoners at Gitmo Under Obama
BY JEREMY SCAHILL AlterNet INTERNATIONAL Posted by Bulatlat As the Obama administration continues to fight the release of some 2,000 photos that graphically document U.S. military abuse of prisoners in Iraq and Afghanistan, an ongoing Spanish investigation is adding harrowing details to the ever-emerging portrait of the torture inside and outside Guantánamo. Among them: “blows…
Remembering Crispin ‘Ka Bel’ Beltran
BY MARYA SALAMAT Bulatlat A year ago this week, Crispin ‘Ka Bel’ Beltran died after falling off the roof he was trying to fix. He was only 75 years old. His wife, Osang Beltran, said, “to think that I’d been happily regarding his renewed weight gain and health recovery…” To this day, she still grits…
Local Oil Price Hikes Exceed Global Increases, Says Study
BY IBON FOUNDATION Posted by Bulatlat As oil companies hike prices anew, a study by research group IBON Foundation reveals that local pump prices have been rising by more than the price of crude oil. An analysis of monthly price data from January 1999 to March 2009 shows that local pump prices have apparently been…
New UP Student Code ‘Unconstitutional, Repressive’
By ANNA KRISTINA P. VIRTUSIO and CHARMAINE P. LIRIO Bulatlat QUEZON CITY — As the premier educational institution in the country, the University of the Philippines has been regarded for decades as the epitome of academic freedom and excellence. But with the near approval of the new code of conduct for students in the university,…
Victims of Harassment Suits Fight Back
The Arroyo government and its allies have been harassing their critics — political activists, human-rights advocates, journalists, government employees, workers, teachers, environmentalists, lawyers, to name some — with court cases that range from the frivolous to the absurd. Now, these victims of political persecution have banded together to fight back.