Rise in Human-Rights Abuses Alarms Advocates

The Macapagal-Arroyo administration has a long way to go in terms of protecting and upholding human rights, according to human-rights advocates. That Mrs. Macapagal-Arroyo did not deem human rights important enough to merit mention in her 2002 SONA indicates not only a lack of appreciation of human dignity, they said, but indicates as well the administration’s “isolation from the Filipino people.”

By Carlos H. Conde
Bulatlat.com Mindanao Bureau

DAVAO CITY -- When President Gloria Mapacagal-Arroyo delivered her State of the Nation Address (SONA) last year, some people were struck not so much by what she said but by what she did not. In her nearly 4,500-word speech, for example, she never mentioned the words “human rights.”

To advocates of human rights, this omission was ominous. At the very least, it indicated what to them was President Macapagal-Arroyo’s lack of appreciation for human rights. Indeed, the events that took place a year after that 2002 SONA, they said, showed that respect for human rights was the least of the administration’s concern.

“She didn’t put any value on human rights,” Ariel Casilao, secretary general of the human rights alliance Karapatan in Southern Mindanao says. “That, evidently, was taken by her troops as a sign that they could run roughshod over civil liberties and human rights, and that was exactly what happened months later.” 

Karapatan’s recent data on human-rights violations and how these have increased the past year is staggering. It said that, between January 22 and July 25 this year, the number of cases of human-rights violations (HRVs) was already at 482 – a 477% increase compared to the number of cases for the whole of 2002, which was 101.

Last year, there were 1,373 victims of HRVs in Southern Mindanao, according to Karapatan. So far this year, the number of victims is already 15,928. Most these were victims of food blockade (8,413 victims) and forced evacuation (4,969). This represents an increase of 1,160% compared to the figure of 2002.

Alarming increase

Casilao called the increase “alarming.” Keep in mind, he said in a recent interview, that these figures do not include the evacuees of Pikit and the 191 cases of alleged summary executions in Davao City.

Based on the documentation of Ibon Foundation, a Manila-based think tank, the  number of HRV cases nationwide between January 22 and May 15 was 2,010, representing 163,023 individual victims, 16,348 families and 70 communities.

Most common HRVs are harassment (threats, surveillance, etc.) at 668 cases; unjustified arrest (230 cases); killings (summary executions, political assassination, massacre at 140 cases); and forced evacuation (127 cases).

“Civilians are the immediate casualty of war and increased military abuses and human rights violations is the direct result of the policy of pacification and war of the Arroyo regime,” Ibon said in its mid-year political and economic briefing presented last week in this city.

Brutality

Across Mindanao, civilians have been bearing the brunt of the brutality of state machineries, Karapatan’s Casilao said.

• In Southern Mindanao, the military has been accused of forced evacuation, food blockade, torture, even murder, particularly in the military’s retaliatory operations after the New People’s Army killed 13 soldiers in Compostela Valley this month.

• In Davao City, a number of people, most of them Moro men, have disappeared and have not been heard from after the bombings of the Davao International Airport and the Sasa Wharf. The suspects in the bombings complained that they were tortured by the police into confession.

• Also in Davao City, police and soldiers raided a youth camp, harassing teenagers who were holding a workshop on how to overcome trauma.

• In the Socsargen (South Cotabato, Sarangani and General Santos City) areas, the military has been implicated in a series of killings of Lumads suspected of being NPA supporters. The military, according to Karapatan-Socsargen’s Peter Jabido, has also been forcing residents to go to the military camp for interrogation. “These residents have no choice but to go to the military camp because either that or soldiers would pick them up off the street,” Jabido said.

• In the Buliok Complex in North Cotabato, the Mindanao People’s Caucus has reported more instances of HRVs during the offensive by the military.

• In San Luis, Agusan del Sur, the Religious of the Good Shepherd-Tribal Filipino Ministry complained in June against the military’s harassment of its members and residents. The nuns denounced the military for accusing them as protectors of the NPA and for allegedly derailing the government’s development programs in the area.

• Practically all regions in Mindanao have been experiencing massive militarization, especially in the Moro areas, Karapatan said.

These are just some of the recent cases of HRVs that have been reported, and Karapatan-Socsargen’s Jabido is convinced that the administration’s “war on terror” is mainly to blame for the increasing number of these violations.

War on terror

“The situation is getting worse. This regime does not have any concern at all for human rights. It is unleashing its dogs in the countryside. They are emboldened because of this war on terror, which the military has exploited for its counter-insurgency operations at the expense of civilians,” he said.

Jabido’s assertion is consistent with the findings of the Human Rights Watch, an international human-rights watchdog. In a March report to the United Nations Commission on Human Rights titled “In the Name of Counter-Terrorism: Human Rights Abuses Worldwide,” HRW said the campaign against terrorism “has led to human rights violations in many countries worldwide. In some cases, governments have enacted new security laws that violate basic rights and freedoms, or have denied terrorist suspects due process and the protection of law. In other cases, the war against terrorism has been used by governments opportunistically to justify the repression of opponents or arbitrary and punitive measures against asylum seekers and other non-nationals.”

Just as terrorism targets innocent civilians, it added, “so too are innocent civilians becoming casualties in the international campaign against terrorism.”

In May this year, Amnesty International, another international human-rights group, released a report that practically condemned the Arroyo administration for the increasing number of HRVs in 2002. "Despite an extensive range of institutional and procedural safeguards, complaint mechanisms and legal sanctions, suspected perpetrators of serious human rights violations were rarely brought to justice and a climate of impunity persisted," Amnesty International said.

"Failures in the administration of justice derived repeatedly from unjustified use of arrests without warrant, mainly against ordinary criminal suspects but also against suspected insurgents," it added.

Clearly, the Arroyo administration has a long way to go in terms of protecting and upholding human rights, Karapatan’s Casilao said. That Mrs. Macapagal-Arroyo did not deem human rights important enough to merit mention in her 2002 SONA indicates not only a lack of appreciation of human dignity, he said, but indicates as well the administration’s “isolation from the Filipino people.”

Would Monday’s SONA be any different? “We have no reason to think that it would be,” Casilao replied. Bulatlat.com

Related article: ‘The AFP Values Human Rights’

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