Eastern Mindanao Command scores NPAs for irresponsible remarks

From the Philippine News Agency (Dec 6): Eastern Mindanao Command scores NPAs for irresponsible remarks

Eastern Mindanao Command chief Lt. Gen. Aurelio Baladad scored the New People's Army (NPA) for stating that civilians should not ride military vehicles to avoid getting shot at.

The rebels made this statement in wake of their recent ambush of a military ambulance which resulted in the death of four civilians and wounding of seven others at Barangay Marfil, Rosario town, Agusan Del Sur early this week.

“Such statement is a sign of irresponsibility and arrogance on the part of the NPA bandits. Our soldiers in the field are ambassadors of goodwill and you cannot deny the community to associate with them and seek their assistance,” Baladad said.

“These bandits have been indiscriminately violating the International Humanitarian Law (IHL), the very same law that they are always invoking to be observed and followed by the Armed Forces of the Philippines and Philippine National Police. Yet, the Rosario, Agusan Del Sur massacre was just another proof of their true intension not to be truly compliant to IHL and merely use it as propaganda and protection from their criminal activities where the ambush of an ambulance was only a case in point," the Eastern Mindanao Command chief stressed.

The massacre claimed the lives of four civilian including a four-month pregnant Manobo mother identified as Jocelyn Cerna, 27 and the wounding of seven others.

In an spontaneous indignation rally held last Dec. 2, about 500 barangay folks and most of whom are Indigenous People, condemned the act and urged the NPAs to spare the civilians, the woman and the children in their terroristic activities.

http://www.pna.gov.ph/index.php?idn=1&sid=&nid=1&rid=713476