Press Release
November 15, 2023

BANGKOK, Thailand—A global conference on counterinsurgency and peace in the Philippines urged the Philippine government to initiate genuine steps towards building a just and lasting peace by first addressing the root causes of armed conflict in the country. 

In a conference themed “The Peace We Want,” the International Coalition for Human Rights in the Philippines (ICHRP) gathered over 120 delegates representing 30 organizations across the globe last November 7 to 9 to discuss the impacts of the continuing counterinsurgency war and violations of international humanitarian law in the Philippines under the Ferdinand Marcos Jr. government.

ICHRP Chairperson Peter Murphy said that a just and lasting peace in the Philippines remains the coalition’s foremost objective and is an integral part of its commitment and solidarity with the Filipino people.

“And so we urge the Philippine government to honor the past objective and agenda of the peace process which is to address the root causes of continuing armed conflict in the country – landlessness, joblessness, and crushing poverty,” Murphy said.

The peace talks between the Government of the Republic of the Philippines (GRP) and the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) was cancelled by former President Rodrigo Duterte in June 2017, a process which has not been resumed by Marcos Jr., the first president to do so since 1986. 

In her speech at the conference, NDFP Negotiating Panel Member Coni Ledesma blamed the GRP for cancelling the scheduled fifth round of formal talks in June 2017 which was set to approve an “interim peace agreement” that included a deal on free land distribution among the poorest of farmers.

“The GRP has used many excuses to cancel or suspend or terminate the talks when progress is made on socio-economic reforms. Just before [former President Rodrigo] Duterte terminated the talks in 2017, the working groups on both the GRP and the NDFP agreed on free distribution of land. This was a big breakthrough. And then the termination, which has been going until now,” Ledesma said.

She added that the GRP must demonstrate the political will to recognize, face and accept the basic problems in the Philippines and agree to work with the NDFP to start solving these problems.

In his own message to the conference, Manila Economic and Cultural Office Chairperson and former GRP Negotiating Panel Chairperson Silvestre Bello III said the 2016-2017 negotiations with the NDFP “were so close in signing an interim peace agreement.”

“In order for us to achieve peace in our country, we should not be signing peace agreements alone but we should be addressing the root causes of the armed conflict,” Bello said.

“It is therefore incumbent upon the government to eradicate what breeds insurgency and discontent. Doing so will sow the seeds of peace,” he added.

Since the suspension of the peace talks in 2017, the Duterte government designated the NDFP as a terrorist organization through the creation of the Anti-Terrorism Council and Anti-Terrorism Act. Dozens of NDFP consultants have been tortured and killed while convalescing or as war captives of the Philippine military, in direct violation of international humanitarian law (IHL). 

In its approved General Program of Action for 2024 to 2027, ICHRP said it shall continue to inform its members and allies worldwide on the Filipino people’s aspirations for a just and lasting peace, self-determination and national sovereignty.

For comment: Peter Murphy, Chairperson, ICHRP Global Council +61 418 312 301

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Press Release
November 11, 2023

Bangkok, Thailand— Over 100 human rights advocates from over 30 organizations across the globe held a 3 day conference and assembly to decry the implementation of US counterinsurgency tactics in the Philippines and to advance international defense of human rights under the new Marcos regime. 

Throughout the conference, human rights experts exposed the ongoing violations of human rights and international humanitarian law, including extra-judicial killings, disappearances, intensifying suppression of civil liberties, slanderous designation of respected leaders as terrorists via the Anti-Terror Act (ATA), and relentless red-tagging of activists, progressive organizations, and solidarity activists via the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC).

Edith Burgos of the Karapatan National Council, identified the counterinsurgency programs of the Marcos government as, “responsible for the steadily deteriorating human rights situation in the Philippines and escalating violations of International Humanitarian Law directed against the Filipino people.”

Burgos’ criticism of Marcos counterinsurgency programs exposed the reality that the human rights atrocities committed by the Philippine military and police are not only aided and abetted by US military aid (over 1 billion US dollars since 2015) and the presence of nine US military bases in the country – but patterned after US counterinsurgency tactics. 

Suzanne Adely, President of the National Lawyers Guild, explained counterinsurgency as “the organized use of subversion and violence to seize, nullify, or challenge political control of a region.” She noted that the US has employed counterinsurgency tactics since its colonial operations in the Philippines began in 1898. She further pointed out how the use of the term “insurgency” attempts to delegitimize people’s resistance, including armed resistance, as “terrorism,” and drew parallels between the Palestinian people’s struggle for liberation and the Filipino people’s fight against the US-backed Marcos regime. 

Edre Olalia, President of the National Union of People’s Lawyers in the Philippines, explained the significance of International Humanitarian Law in the context of the current situation in the Philippines. Olalia expounded that contrary to US counterinsurgency doctrine, armed resistance movements in response to the severe oppression of peoples is legal under the Geneva conventions, and further emphasized the importance of the protection of civilians and non combatants in the context of civil war.  

ICHRP chairperson Peter Murphy emphasized the critical role of solidarity in supporting the Filipino people’s aspirations for a just and lasting peace that is free from the injustice of poverty, landlessness, and state repression. He reflected on ICHRP’s role in investigating and exposing the dire human rights situation as well as coordinating an election observers mission which found massive fraud, vote-buying, and red-tagging and intimidation during the 2022 elections. 

“The devastating number of attacks that continue under the Marcos regime in the Philippines – the many disappearances, the forced surrenderees, and the killings of NDFP peace consultants, are all violations of international humanitarian law done in the guise of US-designed counterinsurgency programs. The international community must oppose these.”

Organizations from Canada to India, France to Australia committed to strengthening solidarity support for the Filipino people, continuing to conduct broad education and information dissemination on the situation in the Philippines, lobby their respective government bodies, and oppose foreign support for war crimes in the country. 

“The struggle for a just and lasting peace in the Philippines is not a struggle isolated from the people of the world; we will continue to fervently campaign until the demands of the Filipino people are met and activists no longer live in fear of reprisal.” 

For comment: Peter Murphy, Chairperson, ICHRP Global Council +61 418 312 301

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