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Bu-lat-lat (boo-lat-lat) verb: to
search, probe, investigate, inquire; to unearth facts
Vol. VI, No. 27 August
13 - 19, 2006 Quezon City, Philippines |
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DEMOCRATIC SPACE
Free the Tagaytay Five! Free All Political Prisoners
in the Philippines!
On April 28, 2006, the writer Axel Alejandro Pinpin
and four companions were abducted in Sungay village,
Tagaytay City, by the Philippine National Police and
charged with rebellion.
Pinpin's companions, researchers Aristedes Sarmiento and
Riel Custodio, together with local residents Enrico
Ybañez and Michael Masayes, were on the way to attend
Labor Day commemoration events in Cavite and Quezon.
All were tortured, held incommunicado for a week, all
their personal property confiscated by the police.
They are now detained at Camp Vicente Lim, Canlubang,
Laguna. They have been padlocked for over 100 days
now in cells measuring 5 x 6 meters, with minimum
ventilation and unhygienic regimen (Bulatlat,
May 14-20; May 28-June 3, 2006, reports by Dennis
Espada; Press Statement from Laura Sarmiento, Aug. 4,
2006).
Pinpin, a graduate of Cavite State University, was
1999 Fellow of the University of the Philippines
Writers Workshop. Riel is an organizer for the
Farmer's Federation in Cavite.
Like most citizens critical of the Arroyo regime,
Pinpin and his companions, now known as the "Tagaytay
5," were accused of being members of the
Communist-led New People's Army (NPA) engaged in
"destabilization plots." Their experience falls into
the well-documented pattern of State terrorism:
harassment of Bayan Muna (People First) and other
party-list activists (the most prominent is Rep.
Crispin Beltran), warrantless arrests, kidnapping,
"disappearances," and extra-judicial killings by
paramilitary death-squads and/or government troops.
Over 700 civilians (nearly half of whom are
affiliates of cause-oriented groups) have been
murdered since Arroyo became president in January
2001, according to Karapatan (Alliance for the
Advancement of People's Rights).
The flagrant terrorism of the Arroyo-led state
apparatus has now been universally condemned by the
United Nations Human Rights Committee, Amnesty
International, U.S. National Lawyers Guild, Asian
Commission of Human Rights, and other transnational
bodies. Arroyo's complicity with kidnappings,
tortures, and murders may be prosecuted under the
terms of the 1966 International Covenant of Civil and
Political Rights as well as various international
treaties and protocols signed by the government.
The massive political killings and enforced
"disappearances" recall the genocidal "Phoenix"
massacres of Vietnamese suspects during the Vietnam
War in the sixties supervised by Central
Intelligsence Agency (CIA) agent Col. Edward
Lansdale, chief adviser to Ramon Magsaysay. It also
recalls the systematic "vigilante" low-intensity
assassinations during the Aquino administration. The
U.S. gives annually several hundred million dollars'
worth of military aid (weapons, logistics, training)
ostensibly to fight "international terrorism." But
this aid is used to suppress the NPA combatants,
Muslim separatists, as well as ordinary Filipinos
critical of Arroyo's corruption, cheating, and
subservience to the Bush administration.
Recently, the U.S. and Arroyo set up a Security
Engagement Board to legitimize a prolonged U.S.
military presence in violation of the Philippine
Constitution (Article II, Sec. 3) prohibiting foreign
troops from getting involved in internal security
matters (IBON Media Release, May 26, 2006). These
violations have been rampant since the country became
"independent" in 1946.
Since 2001, the U.S. has manipulated the Arroyo
regime to maintain its hegemony and strategic
economic-political dominance in Southeast Asia with a
predominantly Muslim population. Recently, U.S.
Intelligence head John Negroponte met with Arroyo
advisers Eduardo Ermita and Norberto Gonzales to
implement U.S. directives. Hundreds of U.S. Special
Forces operate in Mindanao, Sulu, and other regions
of the Philippines to counter insurgents of the Moro
National Liberation Front, Moro Islamic Liberation
Front, and the NPA guerillas, under the guise of
rooting out the CIA-begotten terrorist group, the Abu
Sayyaf.
After President George W. Bush's visit in October
2003, the Philippines was declared a "model for
Iraq," a "sovereign" country open any time to U.S.
political and military intervention. One result of
this regular infringement of Philippine sovereignty
is the gang rape of a 22-year old woman by six U.S.
soldiers last November 2005. Hundreds of such cases
occurred periodically, without a single court
indictment, when the U.S. military bases in Clark
Field and Subic Bay functioned from 1946 to 1992.
Under all accepted norms of republican democratic
states today, Pinpin and the other Tagaytay political
prisoners are presumed innocent until proven guilty.
When constitutionally mandated due process and other
civil liberties are denied the citizens of the
Republic, then a fascist authoritarian order has
usurped power. It is the right of all citizens to
overthrow such an illegitimate government and replace
it with one truly representative of the common
welfare and the consent of the governed.
We are petitioning the United Nations and the World
Court of Justice to condemn the intolerable
violations of human rights in the Philippines being
committed daily by the Arroyo regime. U.S. citizens
should demand cutting off military and other
assistance to the tyrannical Arroyo regime. Citizens
of other countries should pressure their governments
to terminate normal relations with the illegitimate
and corrupt Arroyo regime.
The officers and staff of PCSC protest the unjust
torture and imprisonment of the Tagaytay 5, Crispin
Beltran, and other political prisoners. We demand
their immediate release and indemnification. JUSTICE
TO ALL VICTIMS OF MILITARY VIOLENCE AND STATE
OPPRESSION!
THE PHILIPPINES CULTURAL STUDIES CENTER (PCSC)
Dr. E. San Juan, Jr., Director
Alegria Concepcion, Staff Coordinator
Storrs, CT, USA
Posted by Bulatlat
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© 2006 Bulatlat
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