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<h1 style="direction: ltr;" id="pf-title">The Philippine People
Are Under Attack from Washington — and Their Own Government</h1>
<span id="pf_author">By Vanessa Lucas and Azadeh Shahshahani ,
December 3, 2015 .</span>
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<div class="pf-content">
<div style="width: 612px;" id="attachment_30468"
class="wp-caption aligncenter pf-caption blockImage">
<p class="wp-caption-text">Lumad marchers in the
Philippines (Photo: Bro. Jeffrey Pioquinto, SJ / Flickr)</p>
</div>
<p>The Filipino people are under attack.</p>
<p>The Lumad, for example — an indigenous group in the
southern Philippines — are being forced to leave their
ancestral lands and the source of their livelihood to make
way for mining operations and land conversion. Resistance
is deadly.</p>
<p>In the month of August alone, there were two massacres
that left nine dead. On August 30, the army and
paramilitary forces occupied the Alternative Learning
Center for Agriculture and Livelihood Development, an
award winning school for indigenous youth. The director of
the school, Emerito Samarca, was taken by force and was
found dead in a classroom the next day. He had an
ear-to-ear slit across his throat and gunshot wounds in
his chest.</p>
<p>The same day Samarca’s body was found, Dionel Campos —
the chairman of a Lumad organization campaigning against
mining — and his cousin Datu Juvillo Sinzo were executed
in front of hundreds of residents in Lianga. Sinzo, who
was separated from the crowd, was tortured by
paramilitaries. They smashed his arms and legs with a
wooden stick before shooting him.</p>
<p>Karapatan, a Filipino human rights organization, has
raised the issue of the Lumad peoples at the United
Nations Human Rights Council. But given the culture of
impunity in the Philippines — often exacerbated by
implicit support from the U.S. government — activists are
pursuing other means to hold the perpetrators of crimes
like these to account.</p>
<p>To help give voice to the victims of human rights
violations, for three intense days this summer we
participated in the International People’s Tribunal on
Crimes Against the Filipino People. The tribunal was
convened in Washington by human rights defenders, peace
and justice advocates, lawyers, jurists, academics, people
of faith, and political activists. It was held at the
behest of victims of human rights violations to shine a
spotlight on official crimes and hold the responsible
governments accountable.</p>
<p>Evidence supporting the allegations of rights abuses —
including testimony from over 30 lay and expert witnesses
— was provided to an international panel of prosecutors
led by former U.S. attorney general Ramsey Clark and
considered by an international group of jurors from a
range of disciplines. The tribunal found the Aquino regime
responsible for systematic violations of the civil,
political, economic, social, and cultural rights of the
Filipino people. The conveners also held the U.S.
government responsible on account of its military
intervention, economic and environmental exploitation, and
imposition of neoliberal globalization on the Philippines.</p>
<p>Here’s what we learned.</p>
<p><strong><span class="text-node">Violations of Civil and
Political Rights</span></strong></p>
<p>The first group of charges focused on gross violations of
civil and political rights, including extrajudicial
killings, disappearances, massacres, torture, and
arbitrary arrests and detention, as well as other brutal
and systematic attacks on the basic democratic rights of
the Filipino people.</p>
<p>A key driver of the most egregious abuses has been the
U.S.-inspired counter-insurgency program <a
target="_blank" title="Oplan Bayanihan"
href="http://www.humanrightsphilippines.net/tag/oplan-bayanihan/"
onclick="__gaTracker('send', 'event',
'outbound-article',
'http://www.humanrightsphilippines.net/tag/oplan-bayanihan/',
'Oplan Bayanihan');"><span class="text-node">Oplan
Bayanihan</span></a>. Launched in 2011 by Philippine
President Benigno Aquino III, it’s supposedly a program to
fight communist guerillas, but in practice doesn’t
distinguish between civilians and combatants. The reality
is that Oplan Bayanihan is used to target any individuals
or groups the government classifies as a threat to its
agenda.</p>
<p>Amaryllis Hilao Enriquez, a former Marcos-era political
prisoner, described Oplan Bayanihan as a “repackaging” of
the U.S.-led “war on terror” for the Philippines. The
operation was devised with <a title="the help of the U.S.
government"
href="http://fpif.org/u-s-aid-human-rights-violations-philippines/"><span
class="text-node">the help of the U.S. government</span></a>,
which provides technical assistance, military aid, and
occasionally actual U.S. military personnel.</p>
<p>Following Enriquez’s testimony, the jurors heard personal
accounts of gross human rights violations.</p>
<p>Maria Aurora Santiago, for example, recounted the death
of her partner, <a target="_blank" title="Wilhemus
Geertman"
href="http://archive.sunstar.com.ph/pampanga/local-news/2013/02/15/groups-assert-geertman-s-case-extrajudicial-killing-268389"
onclick="__gaTracker('send', 'event',
'outbound-article',
'http://archive.sunstar.com.ph/pampanga/local-news/2013/02/15/groups-assert-geertman-s-case-extrajudicial-killing-268389',
'Wilhemus Geertman');"><span class="text-node">Wilhemus
Geertman</span></a> — a Dutch lay missionary who was
targeted by the Philippine military due to his involvement
in peasant organizing and advocacy. He was the executive
director of Alay Bayan-Luson, a grassroots organization
involved in disaster preparedness, mitigation, and victim
assistance, especially to poor communities. Geertman was
also involved in numerous environmental campaigns against
mining, logging, and dam projects. Accused of belonging to
the New People’s Army — the armed wing of the Communist
Party of the Philippines — he was shot to death in his
office by military and police assets.</p>
<p>Attorney Maria Catherine Salucon, a founding member of
the National Union of People’s Lawyers, then opened the
jurors’ eyes to the fact that even lawyers working on
human rights cases are subjected to open harassment and
intimidation. Like Geertman, Salucon — who represents
clients in cases involving violations of human rights and
political prisoners — has been subjected to red tagging
and vilified as a member of Communist Party.</p>
<p>One day, Salucon and her paralegal William Bugatti had
lunch with relatives of their detained political prisoner
clients. During the meal, Bugatti told Salucon that he was
taking precautionary security measures and advised her to
do the same. Later that night, he was gunned down by
government security forces.</p>
<p>After learning of Bugatti’s death, Salucon was told by a
client — a civilian asset for the Philippine National
Police — that the PNP was investigating her to “confirm”
that she was a “red lawyer.” Salucon also learned she was
being secretly followed by military intelligence officers.
Salucon took the matter to the courts and was granted a
protective order that allowed her access to military
records pertaining to her, but the military continues to
deny conducting any surveillance activities against her at
all.</p>
<p>Melissa Roxas, a Filipina-American activist, then
testified concerning her May 2009 abduction and torture at
the hands of Philippine military. She was captured while
conducting health surveys organized by a social justice
alliance.</p>
<p>Roxas, who has also conducted fact-finding missions into
rights abuses, and two Filipino volunteers — John Edward
Jamdoc and Juanito Carabeo — were abducted by
approximately 15 men armed with high-powered rifles, some
of them wearing ski masks or bonnets. They were handcuffed
and blindfolded and forced into a van.</p>
<p>Roxas was held for six days at a military camp, most of
which she spent in handcuffs and blindfolded, and accused
of belonging to the New People’s Army. She was subjected
to food deprivation, forced into stress positions, beaten,
choked, suffocated with plastic bags, and repeatedly
smashed headfirst against a wall. She was lectured on the
evils of communism by torturers who threatened her with
death and tried to force her to sign documents confessing
that she was a militant. Despite her ability to describe
some of her abductors and torturers in court, no one has
been arrested or charged for her abduction and torture.</p>
<p><strong><span class="text-node">Violations of Economic,
Social, and Cultural Rights </span></strong></p>
<p>The second group of charges concerned an array of abuses
against Filipinos’ economic, social, and cultural rights —
especially through the imposition of neoliberal economic
policies, various attacks on the livelihoods of ordinary
people, the transgression of their economic sovereignty,
and the destruction of the environment.</p>
<p>The scope of these violations was put into perspective by
economist Jose Enrique Africa, who presented an overview
on the general socio-economic situation of the
Philippines. Notably, he pointed out, around two-thirds of
Filipinos — some 66 million people — are poor, living on
just $2.80 or less per day. However, the wealth of the 10
richest Filipinos has more than <em><span
class="text-node">tripled</span></em> under the Aquino
administration.</p>
<p>While ordinary Filipinos struggle to make ends meet,
foreign investors favored by the government are making out
like bandits. Foreign investment makes up 40 percent of
approved investment in the Philippines over the last
decade and a half, he said — not even counting dummy
corporations that would increase those numbers. According
to Africa, the equivalent of some <em><span
class="text-node">98 percent</span></em> of domestic
production is exported for the benefit of foreign firms
and economies. Trade and investment liberalization have
made the Philippines one of Asia’s most open economies
while destroying its national wellbeing.</p>
<p>Mining companies in particular boosted their profits some
115 percent between 2010 and 2014. Yet the Philippines
doesn’t benefit from its mineral resources. In the last
five years, dozens of communities and thousands of
families have been temporarily or permanently displaced —
often violently — to give way to mining projects,
especially in Mindanao.</p>
<p>Despite the Philippines’ rich natural resources and
large, productive labor force, the country has become a
service and trading economy more than a producing economy.
The manufacturing sector, at a little under a quarter of
gross domestic product, has contracted to as small a share
of the economy as it was six decades ago. And agriculture,
at 10 percent of GDP, is the smallest it’s been in
history. The result has been widespread joblessness and
poverty.</p>
<p>Africa noted that the U.S. is the biggest foreign
investor in the Philippines, and American corporations
often dominate local firms.</p>
<p>Unsurprisingly then, U.S. corporations are among the
biggest direct beneficiaries of the neoliberal economic
policies favored by Washington. For example, the
Philippine government has hailed the creation of 1 million
jobs in the business process outsourcing (BPO) sector,
especially call centers. However, BPOs are dominated by
foreign investors, with U.S. companies alone providing up
to 31 percent of foreign equity.</p>
<p>Another example lies in the country’s drive towards
privatization, which is likewise supported by the U.S.
Power privatization has made Philippine electricity the
most expensive in Asia, even more so than in Japan or
South Korea. Water privatization has made its water the
third most expensive after Japan and Singapore. According
to Africa, U.S. firms account for 45 percent of the
Philippine electric power system’s imports and 10 percent
of its water equipment and services imports.</p>
<p>Among the U.S. government’s more egregious interventions,
Africa testified, is the Arangkada Philippines Project, or
TAPP. Funded with $1 million from USAID since 2010, the
project has lobbied Philippine policymakers on hundreds of
regulatory issues. Administered by the American Chamber of
Commerce and the Joint Foreign Chambers of Commerce in the
Philippines, TAPP is among the most aggressive entities
seeking to change the 1987 Philippine Constitution and
remove the last legal impediments to foreign capitalism in
the country. Meanwhile there are at least five other USAID
economic policy intervention projects cumulatively worth
$74 million.</p>
<p>Following Mr. Africa, multiple witness took the stand to
describe how these investment policies have negatively
affected the Filipino people — particularly in agriculture
and agrarian reform (or lack thereof), the situation of
the urban poor, the displacement of indigenous peoples,
attacks on unions and labor rights, human trafficking,
illegal rate hikes for mass transportation, the
privatization of health care, and other violations of
economic, social, and cultural rights.</p>
<p>Rafael Mariano testified about an incident concerning
Hacienda Luisita, a landholding of more than 6,000
hectares owned by the family of President Aquino (and the
site of <a target="_blank" title="violent labor
repression"
href="http://www.gmanetwork.com/news/story/182515/news/specialreports/how-a-workers-strike-became-the-luisita-massacre"
onclick="__gaTracker('send', 'event',
'outbound-article',
'http://www.gmanetwork.com/news/story/182515/news/specialreports/how-a-workers-strike-became-the-luisita-massacre',
'violent labor repression');"><span class="text-node">violent
labor repression</span></a> in the recent past). Under
land reforms passed in the late 1980s, Hacienda Luisita
should have been subject to redistribution to poorer
farmers. Yet the Aquino family and its allies devised a
stock scheme to circumvent the reforms. Small farmers took
the case to the Philippine Supreme Court, which ordered
the redistribution of vast tracts of the land. Yet the
Philippine government’s Department of Agrarian Reform — an
agency under Aquino’s direct control and supervision —
refused to comply. Instead, it harassed the farmers and
destroyed their crops and huts. To date no actual
distribution has been made.</p>
<p>Marieta Corpuz testified about instances of land
grabbing, where peasants and indigenous peoples are being
dispossessed of their ancestral domains to make way for
foreign investment projects. For example, the Aurora
Pacific Economic Zone Freeport (APECO) project — which was
supposed to transform a town in Aurora province into a
commercial and industrial district and eco-tourism zone —
is resulting in massive dislocations of indigenous Dumagat
and Agta tribes on behalf of big businesses linked to a
Philippine senator and his family. Corpuz testified that
fisherfolk, farmers, and indigenous activists who have
opposed the project have been subjected to threats,
harassment, and extrajudicial killings.</p>
<p><strong><span class="text-node">Violations of National
Self-Determination and Liberation</span></strong></p>
<p>A final group of charges concerned violations of the
rights of the people to national self-determination. This
includes crimes against humanity against national
liberation movements and dissidents, who are often falsely
characterized as “terrorists.”</p>
<p>Professor Marjorie Cohn of Thomas Jefferson Law School
noted that the U.S. war of terror — though imposed in the
Philippines as early as 2002 under the Gloria Arroyo
regime — was officially codified in Manila with the
passage of the Human Security Act of 2007, which can be
thought of as the Philippine version of the U.S. Patriot
Act. The law, which contains an overly broad definition of
“terrorism” and harsh mandatory penalties — including 40
years imprisonment without parole for even minor offenses
that could be construed as “terrorism” — can be used to
hold dissidents indefinitely. And it allows the government
to engage in all manners of spurious prosecutions,
according to <a target="_blank" title="Human Rights
Watch."
href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2007/07/17/philippines-new-terrorism-law-puts-rights-risk"
onclick="__gaTracker('send', 'event',
'outbound-article',
'https://www.hrw.org/news/2007/07/17/philippines-new-terrorism-law-puts-rights-risk',
'Human Rights Watch.');"><span class="text-node">Human
Rights Watch.</span></a></p>
<p>The Obama administration, Cohn added, enlisted the Aquino
government last year to negotiate the Enhanced Defense
Cooperation Agreement — <a title="a military basing
agreement"
href="http://fpif.org/obama-asia-washington-extracts-rent-free-basing-philippines/"><span
class="text-node">a military basing agreement</span></a>
that could reintroduce U.S. troops to some of the same
Philippine military facilities they were expelled from
back in the 1990s. It has officially roped the country
into the U.S. “pivot to Asia,” an effort by the Obama
administration to encircle China through alliances with
its neighbors.</p>
<p>“Although it gives lip service to the Philippines
maintaining sovereignty over the military bases,” Cohn
explained, “it actually grants tremendous powers to the
U.S.” She added, “The U.S. also seeks to return to its two
former military bases in Subic and Clark, which they left
in 1992. These bases were critical to the U.S. imperial
war in Vietnam. This violates the well-established right
to of peoples to self-determination.”</p>
<p>Dante C. Simbulan, a former college dean at the
Polytechnic University of the Philippines, convincingly
argued that the adoption of U.S. counter-insurgency
techniques by the Philippine government had produced an
array of grievous rights violations.</p>
<p>The Armed Forces of the Philippines and the Philippine
National Police, for example, receive their training in
counter-insurgency from the Americans. Various
counter-insurgency operations, from Oplan Lambat Bitag and
Oplan Bantay Laya under Arroyo to Oplan Bayanihan under
Aquino, were patterned after U.S. counter-insurgency
guides. Oplan Bayanihan, Simbulan testified, is “presented
in the guise of peace and development. In reality, it is
an operational guide to crush any resistance from those
who work for social justice and support the poor and the
oppressed.”</p>
<p><strong><span class="text-node">Verdict</span></strong></p>
<p>After extensive deliberations, the jury reached a verdict
of guilty on all three counts.</p>
<p>The tribunal called on the defendants to stop the
commission of illegal and criminal acts, to repair the
damages done to the Filipino people and their environment,
compensate victims and their families for atrocities, and
rehabilitate communities, especially indigenous
communities, who have been gravely affected by the acts of
the defendants.</p>
<p>Considering the serious violations of international law
by the defendants, the tribunal also called for violations
to be brought before international bodies, including the
International Criminal Court, as well as the
Inter-American, European, African, and Asian regional
courts in order to expose the defendants and stop their
impunity.</p>
<p>It is time to hold the perpetrators of serious human
rights violations against the Filipino people accountable.</p>
</div>
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