(UPDATED) Mar Acevedo Bocales, as member of the New People's Army, surrendered to authorities in December 2016, then joined the Cafgu.
Major General Ronald Villanueva, commander of the 4th Infantry Division of the Philippine Army, identified the victim as Mar Acevedo Bocales.
Bocales, according to Villanueva, was abducted on January 28 in Sitio Hagimitan, Barangay Bolhoon, San Miguel town in Surigao del Sur.
“The following day, his cadaver was found in the same area. His body was tied and showed that he had undergone torture before his head was cut off,” Villanueva said in a statement.
Meanwhile, the 36th Infantry Battalion said Bocales was part of the paramilitary organization helping troops in counter-insugency operations.
Previously, he had joined the ranks of the New People’s Army, but surrendered to authorities in December 2016,.
He was enrolled into the government’s Comprehensive Local Integration Program, and was later enlisted as a militiaman.
The military alleged that the NPA was behind Bocales’ brutal death.
NPA denies involvement
But the NPA in a January 31 statement denied such claim.
Ka Ariel Montero, NPA Regional Operational Command spokesperson, instead tagged a different armed group, Magahat, which he said was led by Emerson Cuarteron.
Magahat is a paramilitary group which the Human Rights Watch said in 2015 was implicated in an attack on a tribal school in Surigao del Sur province.
“They harass and extort from people earning a living from gold mining in Barangay Castillo and Bolhoon, San Miguel,” said Montero.
For years, the military had intensified its counter-insurgency operations in Surigao del Sur. In 2016, it deployed some 500 troops to fight communist guerillas.
In the same year, the Armed Forces of the Philippines Eastern Mindanao Command said the province would be insurgency-free by the end of 2016.
https://www.rappler.com/nation/194917-npa-turned-militiaman-beheaded-surigao-del-sur
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