THE human-rights watchdog Karapatan has rejected outright the invitation of the Army’s Fourth Infantry “Diamond” Division (4ID) for the group to send a representative to speak before the participants of a course for soldiers to be handled by the Commission on Human Rights (CHR).
Karapatan Secretary-General Cristina Palabay said the invitation, dated August 24, was sent by Col. Alexander Macario, commander of the 401st Infantry Brigade.
In rejecting the invitation, Palabay said Karapatan would not participate in a charade, like the “human-rights training” or similar futile exercises “meant to waste public funds, either from the Philippines or from other states, over activities that will redound to nothing but more human-rights abuses on the marginalized sectors in your respective area of responsibility and elsewhere in the country.”
Palabay added that millions of pesos in foreign aid and public funds from the nation’s coffers have been spent in many so-called human-rights training courses among state-security forces, but the fact is, human-rights violations have persisted and even worsened under the current administration.
“The numerous victims of extra-judicial killing, enforced disappearance, torture, illegal arrest, threats, forcible evacuation and other brutal violations against civilians enforced by the 4ID, the Army and the whole Armed Forces under the Aquino administration are a testament not only to the futility of the same activities, but to the opportunism and deception that your institution employs to legitimize the said human-rights abuses,” Palabay added.
Macario asked Karapatan to join the CHR in the Caraga Region in conducting the training.
Once again the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) human rights front KARAPATAN shows its true colors. The group is not interested in furthering the cause of human rights but rather is only interested in discrediting the Philippine government/military through its incessant anti-military propaganda.
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