Help stop the
killings, Filipino rights defenders appeal to the world
![UPR Watch 2023](../../news_clips49/UPR-Watch-2023.jpg)
By
KARAPATAN
March 24, 2023
QUEZON CITY – Ahead
of the adoption of the recommendations made by United Nations (UN)
member states during the fourth Universal Periodic Review (UPR) on
the state of human rights in the Philippines last November 2022,
Filipino human rights defenders from the Philippine UPR Watch again
appealed for international support to put a stop to the
extrajudicial killings and other human rights violations in the
country.
The group is co-led by
National Union of Peoples’ Lawyers chairperson and International
Association of Democratic Lawyers interim president Edre Olalia who
recalled first attending UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) Regular
Sessions in March 2008.
“I have been here the
first time during the 7th session and now it is the 52nd. We don’t
want to come back here. We don’t want to come back again and again
and again. [The killings] must stop. Whatever the administration, it
must stop,” Olalia said as his closing statement on a side event to
the UNHRC meetings.
Olalia’s group, the
Philippine UPR Watch, cited the report by the University of the
Philippines Third World Studies Center which monitored 227 drug
war-related killings under the Ferdinand Marcos Jr. government,
proof that the State-sponsored killings in the country have not
stopped.
In the same event,
National Council of Churches in the Philippines for Faith, Witness
and Service program secretary Mervin Sol Toquero decried the
weaponization of laws like the Anti-Terrorism Act, in the context of
the government's all-out war or counter insurgency program, instead
of addressing the roots of the armed conflict.
“Also as a member of the
Philippine Ecumenical Peace Platform, I am also asking for your
support for our call for the resumption of the peace talks between
the government and the National Democratic Front of the
Philippines,” Toquero said.
Among the speakers in the
side event, sponsored by prominent international human rights NGOs
led by Civicus at the Palais des Nations last Thursday, March 23,
was recent abduction survivor April Dyan Gumanao, Region 7
coordinator of the Alliance of Concerned Teachers.
“First of all, I would
like to thank everyone for their support regarding our case. I am so
grateful for the opportunity to speak before you alive,” Gumanao,
who earlier narrated how he and partner Armand Dayoha were brazenly
abducted by suspected State agents as they disembarked from a ferry
at the Cebu port last January, said.
A video of Gumanao and
Dayoha’s abduction that went viral was shown at the side event.
Gumanao said she agreed to
be part of the delegation to Geneva in realization that their
struggle for justice is far from over.
“I believe that this will
still be a tough struggle, especially with the worsening case of
impunity, [there is] no justice to a lot of human rights violations
victims. But we are still hopeful a lot of people in the Philippines
are still taking the risk, who are still standing up and fighting
for justice,” she said.
“And we are still hopeful
that our international friends and fellow advocates would stand in
solidarity with us in this struggle. In dark times, what kept us
alive is this certain ray of hope. This is what keeps us going on,”
Gumanao added.
Human rights campaigner
and Karapatan secretary general Cristina Palabay pointed out that
domestic redress mechanisms remain ineffective in delivering justice
and accountability, as she called on the States and international
NGOs to continue to monitor the Philippine government’s actions on
the UPR recommendations.
Three years after the
UNHRC’s resolution on technical cooperation and capacity-building on
human rights in the Philippines, and even with a UN Joint Programme
(UNJP), Palabay said “it is clear that a more decisive action from
the Council, especially a resolution to conduct independent
investigation in the Philippines is imperative.”
“There are no
accountability benchmarks and tools in the implementation of the
UNJP, the joint program may not be the most responsive mechanism for
the delivery of justice and accountability,” Palabay stated.