Duterte order to disregard collateral damage ‘encourages war crimes’ - rights groups

From InterAksyon (Mar 10): Duterte order to disregard collateral damage ‘encourages war crimes’ - rights groups



A Philippine Air Force OV-10 Bronco

By ordering state forces to disregard collateral damage during counterinsurgency operations, President Rodrigo Duterte is encouraging human rights violations and war crimes, human rights organizations said Friday.

Visiting the wake of policemen slain in a suspected New People’s Army ambush in Davao del Sur, Duterte ordered government forces to “go ahead, flatten the hills,” saying “anything goes for now. If there’s collateral damage, pasensiya (too bad).”

“Duterte’s counterinsurgency rhetoric is frighteningly reminiscent of his praise and encouragement for police killings of suspected drug users and drug dealers, which has instigated unlawful force and incited violence,” said Human Rights Watch, which has taken Duterte to task over the years, mainly for extrajudicial killings from when he was mayor of Davao City to the thousands of deaths in his ongoing war on drugs.

Karapatan, on the other hand, likened Duterte’s order to giving state forces a “license to kill and arrest civilians, including leaders and members of people’s organizations.”

HRW stressed that international humanitarian law “rejects the ‘anything goes’ approach to warfare and places specific restraints on all parties to an armed conflict to spare civilians and other non-combatants the horrors of war.”

“Armies must take all feasible precautions to minimize harm to civilians,” it said. “Attacks against lawful targets cannot be indiscriminate or cause civilian loss greater than the expected military gain.”

Troops who obey Duterte’s order “without regard to civilian loss of life and property … would be committing war crimes,” it warned.

Karapatan secretary general Cristina Palabay said they have documented 39 political killings since Duterte became president, 20 of these from January to March 2.

Among the latest killings were those of “farmers and anti-mining activists Ramon and Leonila Pesadilla in Compostela Valley by suspected members of the 66th Infantry Battalion-Philippine Army on March 2; of farmers Ian and Rolendo Borres in Maayon, Capiz on February 24 by the 61st IBPA led by 1Lt. Joe Mark Bitbit; and that of coconut farmer and peasant leader Gilbert Bancat in San Andres, Quezon by elements of the Southern Luzon Command,” she said.

She also cited forced displacements in Davao Oriental, Compostela Valley and Sarangani provinces between July last year and February that were reportedly preceded by bombardments or the arrests of community members.

“Your armed forces have been bombing communities even at the onset of your administration. You cannot use the alleged incident in Bansalan, Davao del Sur, to justify these violations any further and act as if these state agents are all so innocent,” Palabay told Duterte.

Palabay also said they have documented the illegal arrest and detention of 43 persons between July and February, including four organizers of the peasant group Kalipunan ng Samahang Magsasaka sa Timog Katagalugan who were wounded during a clash between soldiers and communist rebels in San Andres town, Quezon on March 7 and taken to the Southern Luzon Command headquarters where they have allegedly been denied visits by their relatives, human rights advocates and church workers.

She identified the four as Christopher Redota, 26, Jennifer Yuzon, 22, Teteng Yuzon and Dana Marie Marcellana, the latter the daughter of the late Karapatan Southern Tagalog secretary general Eden Marcellana who was murdered with peasant leader Eddie Gumanoy in Mindoro in 2003 by what rights advocates believe were troops under the command of then Army general Jovito Palparan.

http://interaksyon.com/article/137602/duterte-order-to-disregard-collateral-damage-encourages-war-crimes---rights-groups