Regional coordinator of Bayan Muna (Nation First Party) Gilbert Rey Cardino was picked up by the military on 6th of June and surfaced 3 days later, physically and mentally tortured.
The son of a media icon, Joseph Burgos (38) has also been abducted last month by the military in Quezon City with his two companions, a male & female and all are still missing. This follows the recent failed attempted military ambush of Philippine National Daily Enquirer journalist Delfin Mallari Jr.
At least 50 journalists have been assassinated in the Philippines since Arroyo took power in 2001, making it the 2nd most dangerous country for journalists after Iraq.
The shooting of 9-year old Grecil Buya originally dubbed by the military as a communist soldier from Compostela Valley in March sent shockwaves throughout the whole country and this was followed in April by the military mutilation and killing of 11-year old Dan Dan Quillano and his mother Betty (37) in Surigao del Sur whose burnt remains have been kept off-limits from their family by soldiers. Dan Dan and his mother were part of a group of 8 women and children resting in a hut in the fields chanced upon by a military patrolwho started shooting at them.
It is important that people are made aware of these human rights violations in the Philippines, says Rosemary Hudson Miller, social justice consultant of the WA Synod of the Uniting Church, of which 30 pastors and lay workers have been killed in the Philippines since 2001.
Australian Federal Senator for Victoria Gavin Marshall has said in parliament that in almost all these cases, the prime suspects are government military intelligence units and the victims have advocated for poor and oppressed people in the Philippines, for civil liberties and for human rights, and some have been directly critical of the government.
We need to show our support for and solidarity with the workers, the people in the Philippines (suffering from these human rights abuses), says Dr. Amir Ali of the Australian governments Islamic Reference Group (06), UnionsWA Secretary Dave Robinson and Young Christian Workers National Coordinator Sara Kane.
UnionsWA Secretary Dave Robinson has asked the Arroyo government in a letter to stop the killings and abuses of human rights, social justice advocates and activists in the Philippines and for a reply to UnionWAs petitions against these abuses and those of community groups sent to the Arroyo government in Nov. 2006.
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Extrajudicial Killings
