Military discovers ‘mass grave’ in Misamis Oriental

From the Philippine News Agency (May 24): Military discovers ‘mass grave’ in Misamis Oriental

CLAVERIA, Misamis Oriental -– Elements of the army’s 58th Infantry Battalion based her has found another mass grave site believed victims of New People’s Army (NPA) summary execution in the hinterland village of Aposkahoy, said a military spokesperson on Saturday.

Lt. Dandy T. Melmida, the spokesperson of the army’s 58th IB, said that the military has exhumed the remains of four unidentified persons at the grave site – some of them hogtied and buried with their personal belongings – last Wednesday.

He said that the first mass grave was also found last April 21, 2014 in the farming village of Farmbugas here with an estimated 12 skeletal remains of unidentified victims believed to have been executed by the communist NPA rebels at the height of the purged in 1986.

Melmida said that a former NPA rebel who witnessed the summary execution 28 years ago disclosed the location of the mass grave to the military authorities.

Melmida said that the informant also disclosed to the military that the NPA rebels executed 36 people, found guilty by the “Kangaroo court” who tried them sometime in 1986 to frame up charges.

He said that the communist guerillas buried the executed victims in several mass grave sites in the hinterlands of Claveria, the bread basket town in Misamis Oriental.

In mid-1980s, the NPA, the military arm of the Communist Party of the Philippines, launched a massive purging known as “Operation Zombie” by killing their comrades suspected of being military informants, including those who withdrew their support from the movement and those who are not useful to them anymore, Melmida said.

Lt. Col. Jose Eriel Niembra, commander of the army’s 58th IB, denounced the unreasonable killings of poor people, especially those who refused to support the underground movement.

“The unreasonable killings perpetrated by the communist NPA rebels still exist today through the NPA’s Special Partisan Units (SPARU),” Niembra said.

He said that the unreasonable killings perpetrated by the NPA rebels show that under the communist movement there is no justice system or rule of law.

Niembra also ordered the turnover of the exhumed bodies to the regional police crime laboratory in Cagayan De Oro City for the possible identification of the victims so that they could be returned to their families for a decent burial.

http://www.pna.gov.ph/index.php?idn=2&sid=&nid=2&rid=646830