Lawmaker Zarate: US has 'a lot of explaining' to do regarding Masasapano

From InterAksyon (Mar 19): Lawmaker Zarate: US has 'a lot of explaining' to do regarding Masasapano



Protest rally in the wake of Mamasapano. Photographed by Bernard Testa

Is the United States covering up its role in the Mamasapano clash?

Bayan Muna partylist Representative Carlos Zarate believes the US government has a lot of explaining to do after the results of the investigation of the Philippine National Police (PNP) Board of Inquiry and the Senate pointed to the American participation in the clash.

The January 25 incident killed 67 Filipinos, including 44 men and officers of the Special Action Force (SAF).

"The American government is now brazenly covering its bloody track, especially with the findings of both the Board of Inquiry and the Senate pointing to the participation of US personnel in the  Mamasapano debacle," Zarate said in a statement.

But based on earlier statements of the US embassy, Zarate said that "lies were being peddled" to cloud the Americans' role in the incident.

The partylist lawmaker noted that earlier, the US embassy spokesman in Manila claimed that personnel of the Joint Special Operations Task Force-Philippines of the US Pacific Command based in Zamboanga City assisted only in the medical evacuation of the wounded and survivors of the bloody encounter.

But on Tuesday, a Pentagon spokesman claimed that those involved were "contracted personnel' of the US Defense Department and not regular US troops, Zarate added.

"This is an unabashed alibi," Zarate said in Filipino. "because, as early as June 2014, the Americans already announced that they have already disbanded JSOTF-P (Joint Special Operations Task Force-Philippines). It turned out that this secretive American commando unit was still very much active even during the bloody Mamasapano incident."

"In fact, JSOTF-P was officially closed only on February 24, or nearly a month after the bloodbath," he added.

Zarate said the US involvement in the Mamasapano incident was "another proof of brazen assault on our sovereignty as a nation.

"The Mamasapano debacle was clearly a US-instigated operation, being part of its so-called global war on terror.  It is not our war as a people, but, our government blindly embraced it, thus, making us, Filipinos, their dispensable pawns, even cannon-fodders," he said. 

Zarate urged the two House panels investigating the incident to invite concerned US embassy officials when the House of Representatives resumes its inquiry on the incident on April 7.

http://www.interaksyon.com/article/107276/lawmaker-zarate-us-has-a-lot-of-explaining-to-do-regarding-masasapano