| New Zealand Prime Minister told: ‘Insist Arroyo order end to killings, rights violations’ |
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| Written by Nonoy Espina, inquirer.net |
| Sunday, 18 March 2007 13:46 |
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New Zealand Prime Minister told: ‘Insist Arroyo order end to killings, rights violations’
In a letter to Clark dated March 16, a copy of which was also sent to Arroyo, Professor Jane Kelsey, urged the prime minister to "talk directly to the Philippines President and insist there must be an end to the unlawful killings and detentions and free and fair democratic elections, and to issue a public statement to that effect so that further tragedy can be averted." A copy of the Kelsey's latter was provided by the leftist party-list group Bayan Muna (People First). Kelsey told Clark that the killings, the "continued unjust detention" of leftist Representative Crispin Beltran and the service of a warrant of arrest on Bayan Muna Representative Satur Ocampo "are systematic attempts by those in power to impede the success of Bayan Muna and Anakpawis [party-list] candidates in the forthcoming [May] election." The letter was dated the same day Ocampo was arrested by police after he filed a petition before the Supreme Court questioning the warrant issued against him on multiple murder charges for his alleged role in the execution of at least 15 suspected government spies in a supposed communist rebel purge in the mid-1980s. Ocampo remains in police custody pending oral arguments on a petition he filed with the Supreme Court questioning the arrest warrant and the charges against him. This is the second time in recent months Kelsey, a professor of law at the University of Auckland and prominent critic of globalization, has written Clark on the human rights situation in the Philippines. The first time was before the recent Association of Southeast Asian Nations summit in Cebu, which Clark attended. In response to Kelsey's letter then, Clark and New Zealand's ambassador to Manila raised these concerns over human rights, which the prime minister relayed in a March 12 letter to the law professor. However, Kelsey said, "along with many others who are monitoring the worsening conditions in the Philippines I place no weight on the assurances you received from President Arroyo." She acknowledged that her request to Clark would be "diplomatically sensitive" for the prime minister. "However, there is a point at which governments that repress their people, especially people who are democratically elected political representatives, need to be held publicly to account," she stressed. "Unless the voices of political leaders like yourself are raised strongly and publicly to condemn the current situation, there is a serious risk that the Philippines will return to a de facto, if not a formal, state of martial law. Some believe it has already done so," Kelsey said. "This is a matter of the utmost urgency," she added. Kelsey said the issuance of a warrant against Ocampo "has surely put President Arroyo's government across that line," noting that the warrant "relates to murders that allegedly occurred in Leyte in 1984, yet Satur was a prisoner of the Marcos regime from 1976 to 1985." Kelsey described Ocampo as "a friend who has dedicated his life to securing justice for the ordinary people of the Philippines." Like it? Share it!
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