From InterAksyon (Mar 22): Palace asked: Why is US taking charge of Tubbataha probe?
A private fact-finding mission asked President Benigno Aquino III on Thursday why the US government has taken charge of the investigation on the January 17 grounding of USS Guardian in the Tubbataha Reef and that Philippine authorities were left out of the investigation.
"This is very, very unfair. How come the Philippine authorities are left behind the investigation and that the investigation will be solely dispatched to Washington D.C.?” said Fernando Hicap, of Anakpawis party-list, one of the main organizers of the 15-man Sovereignty and Environmental Mission that was initiated last week.
“Please allow us to set the record straight. The US government should be the subject of investigation and the political object of criminal cases which the Philippine state should file against officials (and) crew members of the American minesweeper and the US government," said Hicap.
The Anakpawis party-list leader issued the sharp response to the statement issued by the US government on Thursday announcing they would invite officials of the Philippine Navy and Philippine Coast Guard to participate in the US-led probe on the grounding of the warship USS Guardian in the UNESCO declared World Heritage site.
Lt. Col. Jason Chamness, deputy chief of the Joint US Military Assistance Group (JUSMAG), said Philippine officials would be invited to the JUSMAG headquarters in Japan.
He said the American investigators would bring Philippine officials to Japan and brief them on the status of the investigation undertaken by US authorities on the Tubbataha incident.
"We will not accept the results of the US-led probe on Tubbataha. That Washington probe is a triple platinum insult to the national sentiment and collective intelligence of the Filipino people. The US orchestrated probe on Tubbataha is a sham," added Hicap.
For his part, Pamalakaya vice chairperson Salvador France insisted that an independent investigation should be undertaken asserting that the US has no legal, moral and political right to carry out an honest-to-goodness and objective investigation of the January 17 environmental chaos in Palawan.
"The US lead role in the investigation has no moral, legal and political basis and it is bereft of any objectivity. We will not subscribe to any Washington fabricated report on Tubbataha that would eventually exonerate imperial America from its crimes against the people and the environment," said France.
The March 11-14 mission in Tubbataha is composed of Pamalakaya, Anakpawis, Earth Island Institute, Sentro Para Sa Tunay na Repormang Agraryo (Sentra), International Fisherfolk and fishWorkers Coalition (IFWC), Fisheries Marine and Environmental Research Institute (FMERI) and Palawan chapters of Katribu partylist, College Editors Guild of the Philippines and Anakbayan.
The third-party group had recommended the filing of criminal and other appropriate charges against officials and 79 crew members of USS Guardian and officials of the Aquino administration regarding the environmental disaster.
The mission argued that President Aquino and the Government of the Philippines failed to assert Philippine sovereignty and were reduced into lame duck entities.
They said President Aquino could have charged those responsible for the disaster according to domestic laws but he never exercised this decisive sovereign right to claim justice.
Lawyer Jobert Pahilga of Sentra said aside from violating the constitutional provision
on the right of the Filipino people to healthy and balance ecology with the destruction of the 130,000 hectare marine reef park network, the grounding of USS Guardian was a clear violation of an international law and that the Tubbataha incident fell under Internationally Wrongful Act that compels that US government to pay for damages and ensure the full-realization of the rehabilitation of Tubbataha Reef park.
"The Aquino administration should have prevented the release and grand escape of USS Guardian officials and crew members and instead, detain them in any regular jail in the country, while waiting the US government to finish the retrieval of the USS Guardian and pay in full amount the damage and just compensation determined and assessed by independent bodies. The President is not inclined to pursue justice and sovereignty," said Pahilga.
http://www.interaksyon.com/article/57697/palace-asked-why-is-us-taking-charge-of-tubbataha-probe
It's the old commie "fact-finding mission" ploy yet again. Virtually of the organizational participants are CPP front groups. The two mentioned in the article, Anakpawis and Pamalakaya are longstanding CPP front organizations. The results of such a "fact finding mission" are a forgone conclusion and will most likely include the following:
ReplyDelete**the U.S/U.S.military will be stridently condemned for violations of Philippine sovereignty
**any environmental damage caused by the Guardian will be magnified ten-fold
**there will be a call for the extradition and trial by the Philippines of the captain and crew of the USS Guardian
**and there will be demands for end to all U.S. Navy ship visits along with the abrogation of the Mutual Defense Treaty and the Visiting Forces Agreement.
These guys wouldn't know how to conduct a fair and balanced investigatin if you held them by the hand and walked them through it. That is not what they are all about. They are propaganda organs of the Communist Party of the Philippines and their main objective is to descredit the U.S./U.S. military, score points agains the Aquino administration, and undermine the mutually beneficial RP-US military-to-military relationship.