DAVAO CITY – While the Philippine military strongly denied allegations of human rights violations and extrajudicial killings in Mindanao, various human rights groups and lawmakers have continue accusing government troops and militia forces as behind the murderous campaign in the troubled region where communist rebels are actively operating.
Rep. Luzviminda Ilagan has vowed to investigate the allegations against the military following reports of killings of innocent civilians accused as rebels by the military in Surigao del Sur, Davao del Norte and Bukidnon provinces.
She also blamed the military for the abuses committed by pro-government militias, who is being funded by logging and mining firms to protect their interests.
“We must stop funding paramilitaries and we must stop asking mining and logging interests to fund them as well. Moreover, those AFP battalions deployed in Mindanao responsible for terrorizing Lumad communities should be pulled-out and should no longer be funded.”
“Mining and logging interests that fund and coddle paramilitaries should be punished and government policy supporting such initiative must be revoked. Funding killer battalions breeds impunity,” Ilagan said.
She added that defense officials will be made to explain on the massive deployment of troops in Mindanao when House of Representatives deliberates on the proposed budget of the Department of National Defense.
Ilagan said 15 farmers were illegally arrested by combined forces of the 23rd and 8th Infantry Battalions and were forced to board an army helicopter on August 27 in the village of White Culaman in Bukidnon’s Kitaotao town. Among those arrested was peasant leader Ellen Manlimbaas, who is the leader of the Nagkahiusang Mag-uuma sa Barangay White Culaman.
She said on August 18, at least 5 indigenous people, among them a 70-year old blind man and a tribal chieftain Datu Intabol, accused by the military as rebels were allegedly executed in the village of Mendis in Pangantucan town in Bukidnon.
Prof. Mae Fe Templa, of the Save Our Schools Network, also accused pro-government of killing three people in Lianga town in Surigao del Sur – Emerito Samarca, executive director of the Alternative Learning Center for Agriculture and Development, Inc. and also a convenor of the Save Our Schools Network; Dionel Campos, chairman of the Persevering Struggle for Future Manobo Generations, and his cousin Aurelio Sinzo.
She said the paramilitary group Magahat-Bagani, under the 36th Infantry Battalion, as behind the killings. She said the killings forced many indigenous people to flee their homes fearing government troops would also accused them as rebels and be arrested or killed.
Templa listed reports of human rights abuses allegedly committed by soldiers in the region – since April last year, at least 25 schools for indigenous people were forced to halt operations presence of troops in the schools; at least 84 cases of attacks on 57 community schools have displaced and disrupted the education of over 3,000 Lumad children; 5 people, including 2 minors were brutally killed by soldiers last August 19 in Bukidnon’s Pangatukan town after accusing them as communist rebels; 2 civilians were also killed by troops in Surigao’s San Muguel town, among others.
“The Aquino government should be held accountable for all these violations. It is responsible for the formation and arming of the paramilitary groups, the paving the way for the entry of large-scale destructive projects in the ancestral domains, the sowing of disunity among indigenous people, and the killings that have claimed the lives of many,” she said.
Capt. Alberto Caber, a spokesman for the Eastern Mindanao Command, has denied all the reports and said the violence was the result of a clan war and that security forces have nothing to do with the killings.
“As per initial reports we gathered, the violence was the result of a rido or clan war. Authorities are investigating this case,” he said. (Mindanao Examiner)
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