PRESS RELEASE
March 16, 2007 

Arroyo, AFP guilty of CARHRIHL violations

A true soldier of the Filipino people must know and respect human 
rights. 

This was the statement of the Promotion of Church People’s Response 
(PCPR), a
church-based human rights group, as it scored the Arroyo government and 
its Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) for gross violations of the
Comprehensive Agreement on Respect for Human Rights and International
Humanitarian Law (CARHRIHL) – the landmark human rights agreement 
signed by the Government of the Republic of the Philippines (GRP) and the 
National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) on March 16, 1998. 

It is lamentable that military forces are not being true to the AFP 
slogan ‘to serve and protect’ as they engage in counter-insurgency programs that 
target activist civilians, in gross violation of CARHIHL and other existing 
human rights instruments. Today, the CARHRIHL turns nine-year old amid a 
record of 838 extra-judicial killings perpetrated by the AFP through its Oplan 
Bantay Laya I and II counter-insurgency program. 

We strongly suspect that government soldiers are not even aware of 
CARHRIHL as human rights education is not seriously integrated in the AFP courses. 
We challenge government soldiers to study the CARHRIHL document and defy 
the Oplan Bantay Laya design which grossly violates this human rights 
agreement.  

The GRP is a signatory to CARHRIHL, thus we hold Arroyo and the 
military accountable for serious violations of CARHRIHL as the hundreds of
noncombatants were brutally slain on their premise that the legal 
activists are members of front organizations of the CPP-NPA-NDFP. 

CARHRIHL is a concrete gain in the formal GRP-NDFP peace talks, but 
peace talks remain suspended under the Arroyo government as it engages in 
all-out war and political repression that bring gross violations of human 
rights. 


Reference: Fr. Jerry Sabado, OCarm
                  PCPR Spokesperson
                  Contact: 4107623


-- 
Promotion of Church People's Response (PCPR)
pcpr_nat@tri-isys.com