BAGUIO CITY – The number of unxplained killings and enforced disappearances of left-wing activists fell sharply in 2007 compared to the previous year, due to mounting international pressure on the government, the human rights group Karapatan said.
In its yearend report, Karapatan recorded 68 victims of unexplained killings and 26 victims of enforced disappearances, down from 185 killings and 93 disappearances in 2006.
The lower casualties this year were due to the “successful campaign to bring to international attention the extrajudicial killings and enforced disappearances,” Karapatan secretary general Marie Hilao-Enriquez said.
Enriquez said there was “mounting pressure” for the government to improve its human rights record from the international community, including the United States Senate, and the United Nations, which sent Special Rapporteur Philip Alston to investigate the killings earlier this year.
Despite the downtrend in violence, Enriquez said that of the 887 cases of unexplained killings and 185 cases of enforced disappearances from January 2001, when President Arroyo assumed office, to October 2007, not a single suspect has been convicted and sent to jail.
Enriquez added that the continued implementation of the military’s counter-insurgency program, “Oplan Bantay Laya 2,” and the “militarization” of rural and urban poor communities have resulted in the violation of “civil, political, economic and social rights of every Filipino.”
Even the writ of amparo, which was recently enforced by the Supreme Court as a remedy for victims of enforced disappearances, could be “circumvented” by security forces that were suspected to be behind the abductions. – With AP