Army: We don't have missing UP students

MANILA, Philippines -  Army spokesman Col. Antonio Parlade Jr. expressed concern yesterday that the military does not know how to comply with a Supreme Court (SC) ruling that ordered the military to release the three missing activists whom the military claimed were not in their custody.

Parlade said the military will have no recourse but to follow the SC’s order, but he admitted that they do not know how to do so.

“Who are we going to release? They (missing activists) are not in the custody of the Philippine Army,” Parlade said in an interview with reporters yesterday.

He said the military has denied kidnapping University of the Philippines students Sherlyn Cadapan and Karen Empeño and farmer Manuel Merino.

“I don’t know how to deal with it. Right now, perhaps we will conduct our own inquiry and then find out if there is someone to release,” Parlade said.

Parlade said they have asked the UP Registrar for Records of the alleged student activists but their request was denied.

“What if somebody tells us to produce the body of (communist leader) Ka Roger Rosal? If we don’t have him what are we supposed to do?” he said.            

The military has claimed that Rosal, a spokesman and a key figure of the New People’s Army (NPA), died of an illness. The NPA, however, denied this and accused the Armed Forces of spreading lies.

Parlade said the Army would look into the alleged disappearance of the three activists to shed light on the issue.

“We could check our records before then proceed with whatever. It’s time that we have to find out the truth about these things,” he said.

The SC has ordered the military to immediately release from detention Cadapan, Empeño and Merino, who were said to have been abducted in a house in Hagonoy, Bulacan in 2006.

The high court said it appears that six military men — namely then 7th Infantry Division chief Gen. Jovito Palparan Jr., Lt. Col. Felipe Anotado, Lt. Col. Rogelio Boac, Lt. Francis Mirabelle Samson, Arnel Enriquez, and Donald Caigas — are accountable for their disappearance.

The SC also ordered the justice department, the military and the police to investigate and determine the criminal and administrative liabilities of the respondents.

Of the six respondents only Samson is still in active service with the military’s security escort battalion.  

‘No HR violations this year’

The Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) said not a single case of human rights violation has occurred in the country this year.

AFP chief Gen. Eduardo Oban said the government’s new counter-insurgency initiative “Oplan Bayanihan” is working because the military is completely abiding by human rights and international humanitarian law principles.

Oban said Oplan Bayanihan involves a well-rounded team of stakeholders focused on “human security.”

“What we are after are armed rebels,” Oban said when he officiated at the incorporation rites of 195 new plebes at the Philippine Military Academy (PMA) here Saturday.

Oban said the AFP already has a human rights office that receives and monitors abuses by the military. — With Rhodina Villanueva, Artemio Dumlao