“We want international bodies to know what is happening in Mindanao—that the Lumad, in defense of their land, are being killed and forced to leave their communities,” Karapatan secretary general Cristina Palabay said.

Karapatan brought to the attention of the United Nations Human Rights Council the killing of Lumad leaders Dionel Campos and Datu Juvello Sinzo, and ALCADEV school director Emerito Samarca. Karapatan asked for an investigation on the killings and the evacuation of almost 3,000 Lumad in Surigao del Sur through letters* sent to Dr. Chaloka Beyani, SR on the Promotion of the Human Rights of Internally Displaced Persons; Christof Heyns, Special Rapporteur (SR) on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions; Michel Forst, SR on Situation of Human Rights Defenders; and Victoria Lucia Tauli-Corpuz, SR on Rights of the Indigenous People’s. “We are asking the UN HRC to investigate and recommend actions to the Philippine Government on these issues,” Palabay added.

It was the morning of September 1, 2015, when the Magahat/Bagani paramilitary forces under the 36th and 75th Infantry Battalion-Philippine Army gunned down Campos in front of the whole community in Km. 16, Diatago, Lianga, Surigao del Sur. Sinzo, who was separated from the crowd, was tortured by hitting his arms and legs with wooden stick before he was shot. Samarca, on the other hand, was found dead inside the classroom of ALCADEV with an ear-to-ear slit on the throat and gunshot wounds in the chest. “The 36th Infantry Battalion (IB), 74th IB and the Special Forces were at the periphery,” Palabay recounted the accounts of the witnesses.

“While the AFP can lie through their teeth about their involvement on the killings and all other atrocities of its paramilitary groups, the motives are crystal clear: eliminate those who are perceived as enemies of the state, including those who fight for their land and their rights. There is no way the government can deny this as long as it implements counter-insurgency programs like Oplan Bayanihan. The paramilitary groups is one way of tackling this dirty war against the Filipino people. It is no wonder why the AFP has not disbanded these groups—because they work together,” Palabay said.

The killing of Fr. Fausto Tentorio, the massacre of the Capion family, the murder of Datu Jimmy Liguyon, the Tabugol brothers, among others was done through the use of paramilitary forces who are known in many names—the Civilian Auxiliary Forces Geographical Unit (CAFGU), the Special Civilian Armed Auxilliary, the Investment Defense Force, Bagani Forces, Magahat-Bagani, Alde Salusad’s group, and the De la Mance group, to name a few.

Back in 2012, Heyns and then UN SR on human rights defenders Margaret Sekaggya have already sounded the alarm bells on the role of the paramilitary groups in the killings. Their statement can be viewed through this link: http://www.ohchr.org/en/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=12333&LangID=E

In the same year, during the UN’s Universal Periodic Review (UPR) on the Philippines there were already recommendations from member Nations to disband paramilitary groups that perpetuate serious abuses. “The BS Aquino government has rejected this and even continued to multiply and allowed the proliferation of these groups as force multipliers. We reiterate our position that the political killings happening right now is part of the government’s policy and not simply an internal conflict among indigenous people’s as the government wants the public to believe,” Palabay ended.

** Copies of the complaints are available upon request.

http://www.karapatan.org/Karapatan+raised+issue+of+Lumad+to+UN%2C+calls+for+probe

Reference:
Cristina “Tinay” Palabay
Secretary General
+63917-3162831

Angge Santos
Media Liaison
+63918-9790580

———————————————————————
PUBLIC INFORMATION DESK
publicinfo@karapatan.org
———————————————————————

Alliance for the Advancement of People’s Rights
2nd Flr. Erythrina Building
#1 Maaralin corner Matatag Streets
Central District, Diliman
Quezon City, PHILIPPINES 1101
Telefax: (+63 2) 4354146
Web: http://www.karapatan.org

KARAPATAN is an alliance of human rights organizations and programs, human rights desks and committees of people’s organizations, and individual advocates committed to the defense and promotion of people’s rights and civil liberties.  It monitors and documents cases of human rights violations, assists and defends victims and conducts education, training and campaign. 

Armed man patrols Mindanao conference of human rights defenders

An armed man believed to be a government intelligence officer was apprehended by convenors and delegates of the Barug Katungod Mindanao Conference today at the conference venue in Cagayan de Oro City. The intelligence man carried an ID bearing the name Rolando L. Gomonit, Sr. He was caught in possession of a .45 caliber pistol and two magazines of ammunition.

Identifying himself to the secretariat as a member of the media, he asked for a conference kit and was looking through the names of the delegation of the conference. In the registration sheet, he identified himself as a member of an organization he named “Lumad”.

The secretariat then asked the assistance of Barug’s local partner Karapatan – Northern Mindanao and the local Lumad group Kalumbay. They recognized him as the same intelligence officer they have apprehended in one of their human rights activities this year.

Gomonit was immediately turned over to the police. Delegates asked for his camera phone when some of them reported that he was seen taking pictures of the delegates. His phone was found by one of the delegates in the women’s toilet. This they also turned over to the police.

When asked how he knew about the conference, he said he just followed one of the delegates who was wearing a shirt of one of the member organizations of the conference.

About a hundred human rights activists in Mindanao gathered in Cagayan de Oro City today for the Barug Katungod Mindanao (Mindanao Stand for Human Rights) Conference as a response to the intensifying military attacks and political repression experienced by fellow human rights defenders in Mindanao.

The conference condemned the recent AFP-backed paramilitary attacks on a school director and two Lumad leaders in Lianga, Surigao del Sur, and the Talaandig and Manobo victims of a massacre allegedly perpetrated by military units in Pangantucan, Bukidnon.

The shameless deployment by the government of an armed intelligence man on a human rights conference is a glaring example of impunity in Mindanao. Armed intelligence men roam free in the cities and communities, documenting gatherings and meetings and reporting them to the military and the police. These information become one of the government’s sources for trumped-up charges being filed against human rights activists and villification of their organizations and activities.

However, under the internal security plan Oplan Bayanihan of the Aquino government, any information against activists becomes a license to kill, massacre, arrest and villify activists, human rights defenders, youth, peasant and worker organizers, Lumad and Moro rights workers, and members of peoples organizations.

Barug Katungod Mindanao believes that the Aquino government is hellbent on attaining its Oplan Bayanihan targets before the end of his term in 2016. It has thus been intensifying its attacks on human rights defenders by making human rights activities a basis for filing trumped up charges. This shows a new trend of criminalizing human rights defenders for their human rights work.

Today, HKCAHRPP together with BAYAN Hong Kong & Macau led a picket action at the Philippine Consulate General to denounce the killings of lumad (indigenous peoples) in Mindanao and the continuous militarisation of their ancestral communities. The statement below signed by different local and migrant groups was received by the Consul Charles Andrei P. Macaspac.

As human rights and peace advocates in Hong Kong, we are outraged by the spate of killings perpetrated against the lumads (indigenous people) in Mindanao, southern Philippines. The heightened militarisation of their communities has resulted to the displacement of thousands who were forced to leave their homes and ancestral lands under the threat of murder and even massacre.

The most recent murders of Emerito Samarca, Dionel Campos and Bello Sinzo in Surigao del Sur by the paramilitary group “Magahat/Bagani”, that is reported to enjoy the support of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP), has shown to people in the Philippines and also overseas that human rights violations remain unabated and the culture of impunity persists in the country.

Samarca was the Executive Director of the noted Alternative Learning Center for Agricultural and Livelihood Development (ALCADEV) that provides education to lumad children, while Campos and Sinzo were leaders of the lumad group MAPASU. Samarca was found dead inside one of the classrooms of ALCADEV with a stab wound and slashed neck while Campos and Sinzo were gunned down as witnessed by the whole village who were forced off their homes by the murderous “Magahat/Bagani” elements.

To date, thousands of lumads have taken refuge in a sports center in the nearest city where the conditions are difficult. Reportedly, a 4-year old child already died in the evacuation centre.

In the province of Bukidnon, similar incidents of human rights violations occurred just less than two weeks before the gruesome killings of Samarca, Campos and Sinzo. On August 19, residents of Pangantucan, Bukidnon found five dead bodies of their neighbours who were apparently killed by the 3rd company of the 1st Special Forces Battalion. According to the sole survivor of the massacre who is the son of one of the victims and a kin of the rest, he begged the military for the life of his father, brothers and cousins but to no avail. His father was 70 years old while two of the victims were minors at 13 and 17 years of age.

These are just some of the incidents of human rights violations that we believe should be thoroughly and speedily investigated and the perpetrators vigorously prosecuted and brought to justice. We are very concerned at the general lack of progress in the prosecution of cases of human rights violations even those that happened during the previous government headed by Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.

The indigenous peoples of Mindanao are being terrorised by military and paramilitary forces that are under the responsibility of President Aquino as Commander-In-Chief. They need to be reined in from committing more human rights abuses and be held accountable for grave crimes that occurred in furtherance of the counterinsurgency plan Oplan Bayanihan that is conducted to support the administration’s policy of opening up ancestral domains to large-scale mining operations.

The climate of impunity pervading the country’s justice system fosters human rights violations on a daily basis, and it thus very urgent for the government to decisively address these cases and implement human rights standards that the Philippines acceded to.

As human rights and peace advocates, we urge the Philippine government to:

1. Investigate fully and with transparency the killings of lumads and bring the perpetrators to justice
2. Pull out military troops from the lumad areas and stop the occupation of schools, and the harassments and intimidation of the community.
3. Dismantle all paramilitary forces, especially the Magahat/Bagani paramilitary force.
4. Work towards the resumption of the peace negotiations with National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP)
5. End Oplan Bayanihan and allow for the safe return of lumad refugees to their life and livelihood in their ancestral lands.

09 September 2015

• Hong Kong Campaign for the Advancement of Human Rights and Peace in the Philippines (HKCAHRPP)
• Abra Tinguian Ilocano Society (ATIS)
• Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC)
• Asosiasi Buruh Migran Indonesia (ATKI)
• BAYAN Hong Kong & Macau
• Cordillera Alliance Hong Kong
• Filipino Migrant Workers’ Union
• Fr. Franco Mella, PIME
• GABRIELA Hong Kong
• Iglesia Filipina Independiente (IFI) Hong Kong Mission Council
• Indonesian Migrant Workers’ Union
• Interfaith Cooperation Forum
• Jackie Hung, Justice & Peace Commission of the HK Catholic Diocese
• Pinatud a Saleng ti Umili
• Promotion of Church People’s Response (PCPR) Hong Kong
• United Filipinos in Hong Kong (UNIFIL-MIGRANTE-HK)
• United Pangasinan Hong Kong
——————————————————————————–
Hong Kong Campaign for the Advancement
of Human Rights and Peace in the Philippines
c/o ASA, No. 4 Jordan Road, Kowloon, Hong Kong SAR
Tel. (852) 98105070, 97585935 Fax. (852) 27354559
E-mail: hkcahrpp@gmail.com