By Germelina Lacorte
davaotoday.com
DAVAO CITY — World Bank-led development projects are already being carried out in conflict-affected areas in Mindanao even as the government?s stalled peace negotiations with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) in Malaysia have yet to resume.
A series of massacres of civilians in Sulu, including those of two grandchildren of an MNLF leader, provoked the latest wave of fighting between government troops and the Moro revolutionary group.
(more…)
MANILA — Health spending experienced possibly the steepest drop under the Arroyo administration and this has forced Filipinos to pay more for badly needed health services, according to independent think-tank IBON Foundation.
UTRECHT — ? The National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) on Friday filed formal complaints before a special body of the United Nations for the enforced disappearance of two NDFP personnel and charged President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo of the Government of the Republic of the Philippines (GRP) and nine of her senior security officials as responsible for the disappearances.
(more…)
In Compostela Valley?s villages, a de facto martial law exists. Civilians have been tortured, detained, harassed and killed as the military increases its presence in the resource-rich province in order to protect, according to residents and activists, plantation and mining companies. The deaths of Grecil Buya in March and the killing of two civilians by soldiers last Wednesday were the offshoots of yet another case of ?development aggression.?
Related stories:
Grecil?s Parents File Raps Vs Soldiers; Holganza Doubts Girl Was Child Warrior
2 ComVal Residents Killed, 3 Others Wounded in Army Shooting
(more…)