Opinion: Non-refoulement for Joma?

Opinion piece posted to the Manila Times (Nov 5, 2021): Non-refoulement for Joma? (By (Ret.) Lt. Gen. Antonio Parlade Jr.)

 

(Ret.) Lt. Gen. Antonio Parlade Jr.

JORGE Madlos @ORIS, the head of the Communist Party of the Philippines-New People's Army (CPP-NPA) national operational command (NOC), is finally killed. This happened in the hinterlands of the quad-boundary Misamis Oriental-Bukidnon-Agusan-Surigao provinces, where his reign of terror was based for a long time. His violence include the killing of hundreds of Indigenous peoples (IP) leaders who would not subscribe to his and the CPP's wishes and designs, 37 counts of arson involving billions worth of equipment, burning of villages, and the killing of soldiers, policemen and Citizen Armed Forces Geographical Unit (Cafgu) auxiliaries.

I got several messages from stakeholders, thanking me and the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) for a good job for finally eliminating this dreaded monster. One of them is a priest now based in Australia who told me how NPA rebels under the leadership of Ka Oris, killed his father, a local official, who was simply trying to protect his constituents from the abuses and bullying of the NPA band.

Apparently, not everyone is happy about the death of Ka Oris. The CPP's Bayan chairman Carol Araullo has been echoing the complaints and malicious insinuations of Maria Malaya, National Democratic Front (NDF)-North Eastern Mindanao spokesman and party wife of Ka Oris, that the dead CPP central committee member was unarmed and sick when ambushed by soldiers.

Really now, Carol Araullo. We have not heard from you during the streak of killings committed by Ka Oris' men against unarmed civilians, Cafgu, IP leaders, in the past few months. You have been complaining of being red-tagged, denying that you are part of this violent ideology. Now you are so brazenly exposing yourself as one who is most loyal to Ka Oris and everything that he represents. Of all people, to Ka Oris, the ultimate orchestrator of all violent attacks of the NPA nationwide, as head of the NOC and national political director of the NPA?


If you think Ka Oris has nothing to do with the death of footballer Kieth Absalon, or the killing of three ambulant vendors in Masbate and the kitchenware vendor in the Bondoc Peninsula, or the deliberate and serial attack against 21 peasant activists in Panay by NPA hitman @Jurimon, the deliberate killing of peasants belonging to the National Federation of Sugar Workers in Sagay after agitating them during "tempos muertos," the ambush and land mining of civilians in Legaspi and Albay, or the killing of many of those drug suspects in order to blame the police, think again. Actually you don't have to, Carol Araullo, because offhand, you already know about this. And by the way, once more, where were you when all these things were happening?

Was Carol Araullo busy organizing the Movement Against Tyranny (MAT) again? In time for the 2022 national elections, after they failed in their OustDu30 bid?

I bet she is. In fact, this is the primary reason Carol Araullo has to come out and make these accusations of human rights violations committed by government troops against Ka Oris and his medical aide. This is a big fish, and from this big loss the CPP could still salvage a big story for Jose Ma Sison's European handlers.

Their narrative now goes this way: "Human rights abuses continue to proliferate in the Philippines. This tyrant Duterte government, once again has shown its fascist color with the killing in cold blood of a "hors de combat," very sick freedom fighter, together with his medical aide." What's their message: tyranny and state-sponsored human rights violations in the Philippines exist. Thus, Jose Ma Sison, political asylum-seeker in the Netherlands, is not safe from state persecution if returned to the Philippines.

We have to remind ourselves once in a while about this strategy of the CPP propaganda machinery, and this actually served its purpose to this day. Until now, the Dutch court has prevented the Dutch government from sending Jose Ma Sison back to the country to face his crimes.

They are once again invoking the principle of non-refoulement enshrined in Article 33 of the 1951 Convention which provides that "No contracting state shall expel or return (refouler) a refugee in any manner whatsoever to the frontiers of territories where his or her life or freedom would be threatened on account of his or her race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion."

The host state is thus barred from removing asylum-seeker Joma if this would result in exposing him to serious human rights violations, notably arbitrary deprivation of life, or torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.

Do we see "the connect"? But wait. I am not a lawyer but this one is easy to understand. That argument of Araullo and her communist colleagues is not fool-proof.

Who are not eligible for protection under the Convention: those who are deemed undeserving of international protection on the grounds that there are serious reasons for considering that they have committed certain serious crimes or heinous acts (Art 1 f of the 1951 Convention). Is the Inopacan mass murder for which Joma has a pending arrest warrant and the genocide committed by the CPP-NPA-NDF nationwide not serious enough?

The other day the same group of Bayan based in the US tried to block Secretary Harry Roque Jr.'s bid to join the International Law Commission (ILC), a UN body. Kamatayan bloc representative Carlos Zarate urged the international community of lawyers and human rights defenders to stand in solidarity with the Filipino people "who are suffering under the oppressive regime of Duterte." Let's monitor the developments on these issues, and I assure you that narrative of the CPP and Carol Araullo will stay.

Don't ask your government again why?

Go figure it out.

https://www.manilatimes.net/2021/11/05/opinion/columns/non-refoulement-for-joma/1821040