Militant groups decry military vilification, harassment
Militant groups in Aklan have accused soldiers of conducting a vilification and harassment campaign against officials of these organizations.
In a nine-page complaint filed before the regional office of the Commission on Human Rights on December 5, the Aklan chapter of the Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan) and the partylist groups Bayan Muna and Anakpawis urged the CHR to conduct an investigation on members of the Civil Relations Office of the Army's 47th Infantry Battalion and the Civil Military Unit of the 3rd Infantry Division.
Named respondent were Cpl. Ernel Mendoza, Capt. Antonio Tumnog, Sgt. Glen Solina and M/Sgt. Rizalino Rodriguez.
The complainants said that the alleged campaign against them "does not only create terror in the communities where our organizations exist but likewise put our lives in imminent danger."
The militant groups alleged that the soldiers have vilified their organization and leaders by repeatedly referring to them as "communist fronts" during anti-communist seminars in villages and schools conducted since February last year until November this year and in the Army's radio programs.
Lt. Col. Erwin de Asis, 3ID public information officer, said they are not targeting the members of these organizations. "The military only runs after the armed group," De Asis said in a text message.
He claimed it was CPP founding chairperson Jose Maria Sison who admitted that Bayan and other militant groups were fronts of the party.
But the militant groups alleged that even their community campaigns against hunger and dengue disease prevention were tagged as "fronts and tactics of the militants in poisoning the minds of the people." They also accused the soldiers of conducting continued surveillance on their leaders and members.
United Nations special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions Philip Alston has blamed the spate of killings of activists on the military's practice of tagging militant organizations as "communist fronts."
"In some areas, the leaders of leftist organizations are systematically hunted down by interrogating and torturing those who may know their whereabouts, and they are often killed following a campaign of individual vilification designed to instill fear into the community'" said Alston in the summary of his 66-page report.
The report will be submitted to the 8th session of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) early next year.
He has blamed the killing of around 900 activists to the Armed Forces of the Philippines.
Alston has recommended that the government "immediately direct all military officers to cease making public statements linking political or other civil society groups to those engaged in armed insurgencies. Any such characterizations belong solely within the power of the civilian authorities. They must be based on transparent criteria, and conform with the human rights provisions of the Constitution and relevant treaties."