Rights groups seeking to investigate the death of a nine-year-old girl in Taysan, Batangas province have been prevented by soldiers from talking to the victim’s family. Karapatan-Southern Tagalog said the military is preventing the truth from coming out.
Local residents have come out to dispute these claims, stating that the casualty was actually local farmer Maximino Digno. According to Digno’s neighbors, he was last spotted going to his field in barangay Cahil when elements of the 59th IBPA found and killed him. His remains were spotted sometime after.
As of noon today, election watchdog Kontra Daya Southern Tagalog has monitored at least 135 cases of electoral anomalies within the region, mostly from Laguna province.
“Unions are integral to the struggle for those rights, because without a union, what do workers have?”
Carlo Reduta was charged with violations of Section 4 of the Anti-Terror Act, murder and frustrated murder and is currently detained at the Gumaca Munipical Police Station, according to Karapatan-Southern Tagalog.
“These are not isolated incidents,” said Charm Maranan, Defend ST spokesperson. “These are coordinated attacks by the Philippine National Police, by the Armed Forces of the Philippines, and the National Task Force to End the Local Communist Armed Conflict to disenfranchise the people from their legitimate demands.”
To carry that weight is to carry on the struggles our comrades left behind. It is to continue the shared struggle that binds us despite our grief and loss, because what we carry is more than our individual wants but the hopes of the Filipino masses – the same hopes that so many of us have paid the ultimate price in order to make it a reality.
According to initial reports by Save Patungan Now Movement, armed elements of the demolition team opened fire at least 12 times at the residents who set up barricades at entry points. Three residents, Neslie Lantar, Erick Dominado, and Ace Amul suffered gunshot wounds.
From December 2020 to December 2021, there have been at least 29,782 human rights violations, or an average of 82 per day, committed by state forces of the Rodrigo Duterte administration.
Karapatan is calling for the immediate dismissal of all “death warrants” issued last March as well as the release of Lino Baez and his co-accused Anakpawis party-list Batangas Coordinator Wilfredo Capareño.
“Staging a demolition exactly on the day we remember the peasant struggle is the highest form of disrespect.”