Lawmakers score raid at Clark shooting range

MANILA, Philippines - Sen. Rodolfo Biazon demanded an explanation yesterday from the executive department over the conflicting statements of the Presidential Anti-Organized Crime Commission and the Armed Forces of the Philippines over the arrest of former soldiers at a firing range in Clark Field, Pampanga.

 “The executive department must sort things out and tell the public what this is, and if I am not satisfied with the explanation of the people here, then I might file a resolution in the Senate to conduct an inquiry on this matter because this is a national security issue,” said Biazon, chairman of the Senate Committee of National Defense and Security.

Biazon was upset over reports that those arrested in the PAOCC raid were involved in a destabilization move against the government and the attempted plan to rescue Sen. Antonio Trillanes IV and Brig. Gen. Danilo Lim. “And worst, there is even a report that the activity is not limited to the rescue of Senator Trillanes and General Lim but supposedly including an assassination of no less than the President of the Republic,” Biazon said.

Biazon described the PAOCC’s claims as highly irresponsible. He noted that the AFP did not know  anything about the supposed destabilization plot. “To me, if there is no basis to this report of such a plan then this is the height of irresponsibility of anyone who had issued that statement that there is such a plan to rescue Senator Trillanes and General Lim and possibly even an assassination of the President,” he said.

Opposition Sen. Chiz Escudero yesterday described the alleged plot to spring Trillanes and Lim out of Camp Crame as another attempt to discredit leading figures of the opposition. “It’s an outlandish and ala “Mission Impossible” tale which people will never believe or buy,” Escudero said in a statement.

Absurd and misleading

“This is another episode in a long-running series targeting the opposition as scripted and directed by the President’s men,” Escudero said.

Government operatives from the PAOCC arrested six former soldiers, including a former Magdalo soldier, and their alleged foreign trainer in a raid on a firing range in Clark on April 24.

PAOCC chief Mariano Villafuerte said that those arrested were undergoing training as part of a plan to rescue detained Magdalo leaders.

The other day, also vehemently denied reports of an alleged plot to “rescue” him and other detained officers. Trillanes described as “absurd” and “misleading” the claims by Villafuerte.

“It has become a consistent tactic of this administration to use disinformation to distract people from its heinous plots against our people, such as the ongoing Cha-cha railroading and the early relief of General (Alexander) Yano as AFP Chief of Staff,” Trillanes said.

The PAOCC executive director is the son of administration lawmaker Rep. Luis Villafuerte of Camarines Sur, known as a staunch ally of President Arroyo and the major proponent of Charter change in the House of Representatives. Trillanes clarified that only one of the arrested retired soldiers is a member of the Magdalo and had been merely undergoing security training to secure job opportunities abroad.

“To immediately conclude that I am planning to commit terrorist acts because a Magdalo member is undergoing training for overseas employment is totally absurd and can only be concocted by a very imaginative mind. That Villafuerte fellow must either be crazy or high on something,” Trillanes said in a statement from his detention cell at Camp Crame.

Villafuerte was quoted as saying that the PAOCC had placed in custody New Zealander Anthony Newman, who purportedly recruited Steven Curtis Rossiter, a former member of the Australian Special Forces.

Charged with alleged violations of the Human Security Act, the six former soldiers, four ex-Navy and two ex-Army officers, were all released over the weekend as prosecutors sought further evidence to establish probable cause.

Trillanes’ chief-of -staff, Rey Robles, told dzBB radio that Trillanes’ office is currently preparing a resolution seeking for the investigation of the case.

Robles said there was apparently an attempt from the PAOCC to make it appear that the operations were related to a destabilization effort when the senator’s office’s own investigation showed that the “arrests” were part of a harassment over a business dispute.

Robles said a son of an influential politician wanted to take over the shooting range.