Releasing its 2006 Human Rights Report last Dec. 1 in a news conference in Quezon City, Karapatan (Alliance for the Advancement of Peoples Rights) stated that 2006 is the worst year for human rights since the Marcos dictatorship was toppled in 1986.
The human rights group showed statistics to back up this assertion: From January to November 2006 alone, there were 185 extra-judicial killings and 93 forced disappearances. Of the 185 extra-judicial killings, 53 took place in Central Luzon, 30 in the Bicol Region and 20 in Southern Tagalog. Of the 93 forced disappearances, 50 occurred in Central Luzon, 20 in Southern Tagalog and four each in the Bicol Region, Eastern Visayas, and SOCSARGEN.
These statistics, however, are but part of a larger picture that has been taking shape since 2001. The data from Karapatan further show that from January 2001 when President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo was catapulted to power through a popular uprising to Dec. 12, the number of extra-judicial killings has risen to 801 and 208 cases of forced disappearances. At least 345 of the victims were affiliated with cause-oriented groups.
The number of extra-judicial killings recorded in the less than six years of the Arroyo administration is already dangerously close to the 1,500 that were documented by church-based human rights groups in the 14 years of the Marcos dictatorship (1972-1986). As regards the forced disappearances, the number of those documented under the Arroyo administration has surpassed the combined records of the Ramos and Estrada administrations.
Most prominent
From its own monitoring and coverage of these killings and disappearances since 2001, Bulatlat has gathered that the most prominent among the victims were active advocates of social change, new politics organizers, peace and justice crusaders, and critics of the Arroyo government who had called for the Presidents ouster. Many of the celebrated victims of extra-judicial killings and forced disappearances previous to their deaths or disappearances also received messages, mostly from anonymous senders, warning them to stop their political activities or face dire consequences. In fact, many of them were reportedly in the militarys Order of Battle (OB) or hit list.
Such is the political involvement of the most prominent victims that the term extra-judicial killings has been frequently used interchangeably with political killings.
Many of the victims are peasants, workers, and indigenous people but there were also party-list organizers, priests and pastors, human rights defenders, lawyers, journalists, teachers, and students.
Battling the insurgency
The very statements of the Arroyo administrations most trusted national security and military point men appear to show that these killings and disappearances are taking place within the governments counter-insurgency campaign.
In a press briefing covered by Bulatlat last August 21 in Quezon City, National Security Adviser Norberto Gonzales categorically said that legal progressive groups alleged front organizations of the underground Left – are among the targets of the counter-insurgency drive.
