By CPP Information Bureau
The Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) slammed the Aquino regime for comitting the same human rights violations as its predecessor. “The Aquino regime has denied the Filipino people reason to celebrate International Human Rights Day as the past year and a half has been marked by widespread violations of political and civil rights committed by abusive military, police and paramilitary forces of the US-Aquino regime, in the course of waging its Oplan Bayanihan war of suppression.”
“The same culture of impunity permeates the current regime,” said the CPP. “Military and paramilitary units perpetrate atrocities without fear of punishment. In the countryside, they target areas where people are actively involved in mass struggles to defend their land and the environment against the incursion of foreign mining companies and big plantations. Communities which the military suspect to be supportive of the revolutionary movement are treated as armed adversaries.”
“Wherever the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) carries out so-called peace and development operations, it establishes martial law rule over the people,” said the CPP. “It launches operations patterned after those of Gen. Jovito Palparan, where fascist troops impose economic and food blockades, restrict the people’s movements, require travel papers and subject people to body searches. This is not not much different from the conditions in the martial law hamlets during the Marcos dictatorship.”
“They encamp or set up detachments inside or beside school grounds, endangering the lives of children,” added the CPP. “Armed fascist troops violate people’s domiciles, divest them of their farm animals and destroy their crops. There are mounting cases of extrajudicial killings, illegal arrests, torture and harassment of activists and local peasant leaders. The number of political prisoners continue is on the rise.”
“In the cities, the Aquino regime violently demolishes urban poor shanties in its effort to clear valuable real estate for big bourgeois comprador projects under its flagship Public-Partnership Program,” said the CPP. “Fearing the rise of mass protest actions, the Aquino regime employed police brutality just a few days ago to break up mass demonstrations by students and workers in Metro Manila in a desperate effort to stem the tide of protests and mass struggles.”
“For the Filipino people, Aquino’s ‘peace and human rights’ rhetoric is a farce. The regime has refused to fulfill its obligation to release the JASIG-protected peace consultants of the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP),” added the CPP. “It treacherously carried out the arrest of two key leaders of the NDFP on the eve of formal negotiations.”
“For three times, the Aquino government has reneged on its promise to release the 13 consultants of the NDFP,” said the CPP. “As commander-in-chief, Aquino has likewise failed to hold the AFP accountable for its numerous attacks against NDFP consultants in the past, including key NDFP leaders Leo Velasco, Prudencio Calubid and Rogelio Calubad who all became victims of forced disappearance in 2006.”
“Similarly, the Aquino regime has failed to put to justice the perpetrators of the abduction of UP students Karen Empeño and Sherlyn Cadapan, peasant activist Jonas Burgos as well as the Manalo brothers, despite the preponderance of evidence unequivocally pointing to the AFP’s direct responsibility for these crimes,” added the CPP.
“The Aquino regime is carrying out Oplan Bayanihan employing measures that are violative of human rights as stipulated in the Comprehensive Agreement on Respect for Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law (CARHRIHL), which it signed with the NDFP in 1998.”
“The Filipino people must unite and resist the Aquino regime’s Oplan Bayanihan war of suppression,” said the CPP. “They must heighten their courage and determination to defend their democratic rights and fight the terrorism and fascism of the armed agents of the Aquino regime,” said the CPP.
The CPP urged the revolutionary forces to extensively propagate the CARHRIHL and conduct study meetings to raise the people’s awareness of their fundamental political and civil rights.
“Every single violation of human rights by the Aquino regime should be vigorously exposed and condemned,” said the CPP. “Cases from the remotest areas should be brought to national and international attention at the soonest possible time in order to help put a stop to the campaign of suppression being carried out with utter impunity by the military, police and paramilitary forces.”
“Such cases should be immediately brought to the attention of the NDFP Secretariat in the CARHRIHL Joint Monitoring Committee,” added the CPP. “The Filipino people should take advantage of rapid means of communication such as cellphones and the internet to bring cases of abuse by armed agents of the state to the attention of the mainstream and social media,” added the CPP.
“The people’s government will continue to receive and act on complaints of human rights violations. Duly-constituted revolutionary committees will continue to carry out investigations in order to establish the culpability of responsible units, officers and personnel of the AFP and the Philippine National Police (PNP),” said the CPP.
“The New People’s Army (NPA) will continue to undertake bigger and more frequent tactical offensives in order to target and punish the most notorious fascist units of the AFP and PNP and prevent them from further committing abuses against the people.”
