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Tuesday, January 29, 2008

5 activists killed in Bicol

25 January 2007

UNIDENTIFIED MEN SHOT AND KILLEDtwo members of the militant party-list group Bayan Muna in Sorsogon province, while two others were found dead in Ligao City in neighboring Albay on Tuesday.

A police report showed that Ruben Ermino was dropping passengers from his tricycle in Barangay Tabi, Gubat town in Sorsogon, when two men on a DT Yamaha motorcycle and wearing helmets shot him at close range at noon.

Seven hours later, two men barged into the house of Demetrio Imperial in Barangay Sogoy, Castilla town, and killed him on the spot.

The bodies of the other victims—Miguel Dayandate and Julio Camero—were found in Ligao, according to Chief Supt. Ricardo Padilla, Bicol police commander.

The latest killings brought to 113 the number of Bayan Muna members killed since 2001, when President Macapagal-Arroyo assumed power, an Inquirer tally showed.

Imperial’s wife Cristine, 31, denied that her husband was a former New People’s Army member or part of any leftist organization. He was just an ordinary coconut farmer, she said.

Shot in front of 2-yr-old son

“I knew my husband was already dead but they still shot him several times. How could they kill my husband in front of my 2-year-old son? They treated my husband like an animal and did not give him a fair chance to fight back. He was defenseless!” Cristine said.

Bayan Muna leaders have accused the Arroyo administration of condoning the murders, allegedly by security forces.

“Almost all deaths in Sorsogon are being blamed on us. Those accusing us should file a formal complaint in the proper forum and that would be the time we would answer them,” said Brig. Gen. Arsenio Arugay, 9th Infantry Division commander.

Bayan Muna appeal

In a statement yesterday, Bayan Muna leaders appealed to the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) to include the issue of rampant and intensifying killings in the country on their agenda.

They called for “justice to the families of the victims of extrajudicial killings, and the worldwide uproar over the ongoing slaughter of innocent, unarmed and noncombatant activists and other individuals in the country, especially in the light of the coming May elections.

Dayandate and Camero “bore gunshot wounds in the bodies and both were believed to have been killed elsewhere and dumped in Ligao City to mislead the investigation,” Padilla said.

They were reported missing last week, Padilla said. “We are still investigating the motive and identities of the killers,” he said.

Circumstantial evidence

“Circumstantial evidence points to the military,” said Neri Colmenares, a lawyer for Bayan Muna who took part in a small protest against the killings in front of the national military headquarters in Manila.

“Our protest is not only against the continuing killings but also against the government’s lack of political will to prosecute the perpetrators,” he said.

A military spokesperson for Southern Luzon, Lt. Col. Rhederick Parayno, denied security forces had a hand in the killings, and said one of the victims, Imperial, was spying on communist rebels for the military.

“The one who has a reason to kill him is the other side,” Parayno said, referring to the rebels.

An ordinary farmer

The military often claims that many victims of unsolved killings were gunned down during internal purges within the communist movement. But human rights groups, foreign businesses and the European Union have continued to press the Philippine government to do more to punish the killers.

“We expect that as the elections near, there will be a rise in political killings,” said Bayan Muna Rep. Satur Ocampo. “They will continue with the killings with the hope that Bayan Muna will be crippled in the elections.” Reports from Bobby Q. Labalan and Ephraim Aguilar, Inquirer Southern Luzon; and AP

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