Arroyo Government Taunts Judicial System as It Connives with the U.S. in
Shameless Mockery of Sovereignty
BY THE INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF PEOPLE'S LAWYERS-PHILIPPINES (IAPL)
Posted by Bulatlat
The Philippine Chapter of the International Association of People’s
Lawyers (IAPL) vehemently denounces the recent escape of convicted rapist
Lance Cpl. Daniel Smith to the US Embassy staged by conniving Philippine
and US officials.
As a national chapter of an international
organization of human rights lawyers especially from countries where
oppression is most severe, the violations of human rights are most
widespread and the people's struggle is most intense, the IAPL-Philippines
stands firm to contribute its part to uphold the sovereignty and freedom
of nations.
The latest brazen episode that
spirited away US serviceman Smith highlights the lopsided relations that
the US has with servile governments like the Philippines as
institutionalized in unequal agreements, treaties and arrangements like
the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA). It not only underscores the arrogance
of US military forces all over the world for vicious crimes like rape but
ultimately their impunity for international crimes against humanity, war
crimes, aggression and genocide.
The US does this not only by refusing
to be bound or by ignoring international humanitarian law and useful
mechanisms like the International Criminal Court (ICC) but also foisting
self-serving bilateral agreements or twisting them to suit its purposes of
worldwide political, economic and military supremacy.
Even more despicable is the connivance
of high Philippine government officials taking their cue from Mrs.
Macapagal-Arroyo who fall all over themselves in courting favor with the
US in exchange for military exercises and plunderous investments that do
not benefit the people.
By practically lawyering for the US criminal serviceman and barefacedly
toeing the US line, Mrs. Arroyo and her cabal of spin doctors in her
administration taunt the judicial system as it connives with the US in
shameless mockery of our national sovereignty. It is the height of
injustice to the Filipina victim and to the Filipino people who have been
given, albeit short-lived, some glimmer of hope that in spite of the
maneuverings and mendicancy of the government, some form of justice can
still be achieved if they are vigilant.
The IAPL-Philippines strongly supports
legal moves to cite in contempt the high government officials and their US
masters even as it views as very disappointing the latest Court of Appeals
ruling that the outstanding issue of custody as moot, thereby objectively
falling into the grand design of conspiracy between servile high
Philippine officials and their US masters or, worse, unwittingly
justifying their actions.
Mrs. Arroyo will have to face sooner
or later not only the judgment of the people that she has time and again
betrayed in exchange for subservient ties with the US and in her
inebriated obsession of staying in power but also the judgment of
international law and of history.
3
January 2007
REFERENCES:
Edre
U.
Olalia, Esq., IAPL President
Rachel F. Pastores, Esq., IAPL Philippine Delegation Head
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