3 Compostela Valley peasant activists murdered in one day

From InterAksyon (Mar 28): 3 Compostela Valley peasant activists murdered in one day



(UPDATE - 12:55 p.m.) Monday proved to be particularly bloody for peasant activists in Compostela Valley after three of their number, including a couple, were murdered, the human rights group Karapatan said.

Around 3 p.m., Cora Molave Lina, 45, of the Nagkahiusang Mag-uuma sa Laak or NAMULAK, was shot at her home by gunmen suspected to be intelligence operatives of the 60th Infantry Battalion based in the town, Karapatan secretary general Cristina Palabay said in an alert.

Lina, who was hit four times, was rushed to a nearby hospital where she was declared dead on arrival.

Palabay said she had been receiving threats from the military and had been summoned several times to appear at the battalion’s camp. She had also been vilified as a sympathizer of the communist New People’s Army.

At 7 p.m. the same day, Arman and Arlyn Almonicar, both also members of NAMULAK members, were also gunned down, still by suspected intelligence operatives of the Army unit.

Monday's killings came only four days after the March 23 murder of Pedro Pandagay, 48, a director of the Golden Valley Banana Planters Association, who was gunned down in front of his children at his home in Barangay Anitapan, Mabini town, also in Compostela Valley, by two gunmen believed to be from the 46th Infantry Battalion.

Compostela Valley has seen a number of activists -- most of them engaged in agrarian and anti-mining campaigns -- murdered by suspected state security forces since late last year despite unilateral ceasefires declared by the rebels and government.

On October 10 last year, Jimmy Saypan, secretary general of the Compostela Valley Farmers Association, was shot by motorcycle-riding gunmen in Montevista town and died the next day at a hospital in Tagum City, Davao del Norte.

Only three days later, Anoy Pasaporte, 28, a member of the environmental group Panalipdan, was murdered in Mabini town by suspected troops of the 46th IB.

Karapatan observed a spike in human rights violations, including the extrajudicial killings of activists and assaults on indigenous communities in Mindanao and north Luzon since the unilateral ceasefires were terminated in early February and fighting resumed between the rebels and government forces.

Early this month, Ramon and Leonila Pesadilla, who were both members of the Compostela Valley Farmers Association, were murdered by gunmen who barged into their home at the Gawad Kalinga Housing Project in Barangay Osmena, Compostela town.

Before they were killed, the couple had donated a parcel of land for the Salugpungan Ta Tanu Igkanugon Community Learning Center, a school for lumad children.

http://interaksyon.com/article/138084/3-compostela-valley-peasant-activists-murdered-in-one-day