Monday, September 29, 2003
Massacre of youth organizers in Mindanao, Philippines
The Philippine human rights organization Karapatan has accused the military to be behind the gruesome abduction and murder of four youth leaders in Maco, Compostela Valley on the island of Mindanao. The military's attempts to implicate the organizations of the youths in the torture and killing of their own kin makes them only more suspicious, especially since they admitted monitoring progressive youth leaders.
Appalling it is yet human rights organizations are not surprised. Amnesty International's 2003 report mentions that "at least 28 members of opposition groups critical of government policies were reported to have been killed by government forces since early 2001. Four members of the Bayan Muna political party remained "disappeared" and were feared to have been killed. In many cases the authorities claimed that those killed were members or sympathizers of the NPA." One of the specific cases the AI report mentions is that of Beng Hernandez, a human rights worker and journalist from nearby Davao City, who was killed in April of last year.
Appalling it is yet human rights organizations are not surprised. Amnesty International's 2003 report mentions that "at least 28 members of opposition groups critical of government policies were reported to have been killed by government forces since early 2001. Four members of the Bayan Muna political party remained "disappeared" and were feared to have been killed. In many cases the authorities claimed that those killed were members or sympathizers of the NPA." One of the specific cases the AI report mentions is that of Beng Hernandez, a human rights worker and journalist from nearby Davao City, who was killed in April of last year.
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