“The blatant IHL violations and terrorist-labeling of revolutionaries, and even activists, should stop. The summary killings of unarmed or hors de combat individuals should be seriously investigated. Instead of state terror, the roots of the armed conflict should be addressed.
Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (BAYAN)
On the alleged torture and death of the Tiamzons and the Catbalogan 10
Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (BAYAN) condemned the killing of National Democratic Front of the Philippines Peace Panel member Benito Tiamzon and peace consultant Wilma Austria-Tiamzon, saying that instead of killing old revolutionaries, the state should focus on why the people take up arms in the first place.
They released the statement yesterday, April 20, after the Communist Party of the Philippines, confirmed the Tiamzon couple’s death alongside eight other revolutionaries in Catbalogan, Samar on August 21, 2022.
BAYAN called for an independent investigation into their death, denying the military’s claim that the Catbalogan 10 were killed in a “legitimate encounter,” with state forces.
In their version of the story, the AFP said that a boat carrying the Catbalogan 10 exploded after the revolutionaries started firing at their troops, resulting in a 20-minute firefight.
The CPP Political Bureau, however, disputed this claim, saying that according to their investigation, state forces brutally tortured the captives before killing them.
They said that the revolutionaries were unarmed and were actually abducted while traveling towards Catbalogan City aboard two vans.
The CPP claimed that after their death at the hands of the military, state agents placed their lifeless bodies on a boat and set it off to cover up the torture and make it seem like the revolutionaries died in a legitimate operation.
The AFP responded to these claims, saying that the CPP’s allegations are “propaganda and an attempt to deceive the Filipino people.”
But as progressive groups have pointed out, it is the military that has a long history of covering up abuses by fabricating encounters.
Over the past decades, there have been countless cases of rebels killed in “encounters” that have been debunked by eyewitness accounts and forensic evidence.
READ: https://sinag.press/news/2022/08/21/the-afp-is-a-hypocrite-terrorist/
“The killings of revolutionaries in these fake encounters are no different from the tokhang murders in the drug war.” BAYAN said in their statement, condemning the military’s use of terror-tagging to justify their violations of the international humanitarian law.
BAYAN called for an end to terror-tagging and state attacks, underscoring the need to address the roots of the armed struggle to achieve lasting peace.
They, alongside other progressive groups, also demanded justice for the Catbalogan 10, including the Tiamzons who are protected individuals under the Joint Agreement on Safety and Immunity Guarantees as peace consultants.
