Wednesday, July 17, 2013

NO AMOUNT OF COVER UPS AND WHITEWASHING COULD HIDE THE FACTS: HRV IS RAMPANT IN THE PHILIPPINES!

News item : Foreign, local activists launch probe of rights abuses in Central Luzon





In this year’s Aquino SONA, the president would either not mention it or minimize it using the military’s trumped up and distorted facts propagandas on human rights violations in the country. So be it. But whichever way probers look at it, there could be no hiding of the fact that human rights crimes are happening and most of it are being committed by the military against critics of the system, be they leaders or members of church organizations, communist insurgents, HR advocates or progressive oriented organizations and individuals. These assorted critics of the system, at least for military, are without exceptions, communist or terrorist.


Some of the most-mentioned : the APECO area and Luisita, the vast estate owned by the Cojuangco clan, to which President Benigno Aquino III belongs,  the murder of Dutch missionary and development worker Wilhelm Geertman on July 3 last year.


The Supreme Court has ordered the distribution of Hacienda Luisita to farmer-beneficiaries, the land has yet to be parceled out with activist farmers accusing Aquino’s family of attempting to “sabotage” the high court’s decision.


APECO, which was created by Republic Act 10083 sponsored by former Senator Edgardo Angara and his son, former Aurora Representative and now Senator Juan Edgardo “Sonny” Angara, covers 13,000 hectares in five barangays of Casiguran town. Critics of the project say it threatens the displacement of farmers, fisherfolk and indigenous people in the affected areas.


Geertman was shot dead at the office of Alay Bayan Inc., the nongovernmental organization he headed in the City of San Fernando, Pampanga. Although authorities have pointed to robbery as the motive -- the victim had just withdrawn money from a bank -- colleagues and human rights advocates believe Geertman, who had been vilified by security forces as a rebel sympathizer, was the victim of extrajudicial execution.


The ICHRPP probe will be participated by representatives of human rights groups from the Netherlands, Denmark, Italy, Germany, Britain, the US, Canada, Australia, Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong and the Middle East. 



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