2 Reds indicted in Bayan Muna leader’s slay

BAYOMBONG, Nueva Vizcaya — Police have filed murder charges against two suspected New People’s Army (NPA) members in connection with last May’s killing of a Bayan Muna leader and her husband in Isabela.

Chief Superintendent Jefferson Soriano, Cagayan Valley police director, said the two suspects, Renato Busania and Timoteo Corpuz, were held responsible for the May 20 gunslaying of Elena Mendiola, 50, Isabela secretary-general of the Bayan Muna party-list group, and her husband, Ricardo Balauag, also a militant leader, in Echague, Isabela.

Senior Superintendent Jonathan Ablang, regional intelligence officer, revealed in a regional command conference here the other day with Philippine National Police chief Director General Oscar Calderon, that a former rebel leader divulged that a ranking NPA officer had ordered Busania and Corpuz to kill Mendiola for alleged malversation of revolutionary funds.

Ablang, head of Task Force Usig, said the one who ordered the killing was an officer of the Cagayan Valley Party Committee of the Communist Party of the Philippines-National Democratic Front (CPP-NDF).

Task Force Usig was formed to investigate the killings of militant leaders in Cagayan Valley. Since January, four have been killed in Isabela. The latest victim was Mendiola’s successor, Almabella Castillo, who was shot dead last July 20, also in Echague town.

A barangay chairman in Ilagan, Isabela’s capital town, who is a known labor leader, recently survived an attempt on his life.

Last week, Senior Superintendent Jude Santos, Isabela police director, said they have already identified some suspects in Castillo’s killing.

These developments came almost two weeks after President Arroyo, in her State of the Nation Address, ordered the police and other law enforcement agencies to bring justice to the slain militants’ families in six weeks.

Last week, Isabela Bishop Sergio Utleg criticized the Arroyo administration for the spate of killings of known activists.

In a statement, Utleg said that to date, more than 600 activists, church people, journalists, lawyers, and peasant leaders have been killed since Mrs. Arroyo took over the presidency.

Salvador del Pueblo, regional spokesman of the CPP-NDF, earlier alleged that a military-backed "death squad" has been going after leftist leaders.

Del Pueblo alleged that a colonel of the Army’s 502nd Infantry Brigade based in Echague, Isabela, heads the "death squad," which is supposedly composed of military intelligence agents.

Brig. Gen. Alexander Yapching, commanding general of the Army’s 5th Infantry Division which has jurisdiction over the 502nd IB, denied the allegations.