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March 5, 2012
Press Release

DAVAO CITY - Militant organizations, led by Gabriela Davao and League of Filipino Students (LFS), will mark the 106th year anniversary of the Bud Dajo Massacre with a protest action tomorrow (March 6, 2012), reminding the Filipino people of how US troops massacred thousands of Moro, mostly children and women in the island of Sulu.

“History taught us how the vile US soldiers mercilessly massacred around a thousand of our Moro brothers and sisters at Bud Dajo, Sulu on March 6, 1906. Now, after more than a century, US troops continue to perpetrate violence to forward their country’s political and economic agenda in the Philippines. Their humanitarian aids and development rhetoric are nothing but efforts to deceive us to cover up the bloodstains of the past,” said Joselito Lagon Jr., League of Filipino Students - Southern Mindanao Spokesperson.

The US troops attacked Bud Dajo after the Moro people resisted American occupation.

LFS calls the Aquino government insensitive to the quest for justice for all the victims of criminal offenses of the American soldiers. Despite the absence of justice for the Bud Dajo massacre, the Nicole Subic rape case, and the Gregan Cardeno murder case, among others, the Aquino government, according to LFS, manifests subservience to the US government by allowing, and even demanding, the expansion of the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA).

The Subic rape case involved Marine Lance Cpl. Daniel Smith who was charged with rape in November 2005 after a 22-year-old Filipina known as “Nicole” accused him of sexually assaulting her in a van after they drank and danced in the Neptune Club at Subic Bay, a former U.S. naval base. Smith was later acquitted after “Nicole” recanted her previous statements. Gabriela firmly believes that there was a conspiracy between the US and the Arroyo government over the rape case.

On the other hand, Gregan Cardeno was supposed to work as a Bahasa interpreter for the US troops on 2010. He left their home in Zamboanga Sibugay on February 1. But after barely two days in his job, he was found dead inside his room in the Joint Special Operation Task Force military headquarters. Both the US troops and the Philippine National Police in Marawi ruled Cardeno’s death as suicide. But his wife and family said Cardeno had sent a series of distressed calls the day before he was found dead. His wife said it was quite “unlikely” that Cardeno would kill himself.

For her part, Gabriela Davao Secretary-General May Ann Sapar expressed alarm over the recent talks between the US and the Philippine officials as they agreed to allow additional 500 to 600 American soldiers to encamp in the country. “We highly condemn this move since this allows more US troops to wreak havoc on our lands once again, more US troops would mean more women and children to be raped and abused, more Gregan Cardenos to be murdered and the continued plunder of our natural resources,” pointed Sapar.

According to reports, formal Ministerial talks between US and Philippines will resume by the end of March this year and the US-PH Balikatan exercises in Palawan and Mindanao will start on the 16th of April.

“This move from PNoy simply proves that he is a man with no sense of history,” Lagon added.

LFS sees the influx of US troops as a collaborative ploy of US and its puppet, Noynoy Aquino, to protect US owned mining firms like Rusell Mining Corp. and Sagittarius Mines Inc. that are exploiting the natural resources of Southern Mindanao.

“We are calling upon the people to remain firm in the fight against the presence of US troops in our country. We must gather massive support from different sectors of our society to have treaties like Visiting Forces Agreement and Mutual Defense Treaty abolished. Let us intensify the national democratic struggle against US interventionism and domination the way the Filipino revolutionaries and the Moro people resisted US fascism before,” Lagon concluded. ###


For reference:
JOSELITO LAGON, JR.
League of Filipino Students
Regional Spokesperson
0923-369-8490

MAY ANN SAPAR
GABRIELA Davao
Secretary-General
0946-189-3168
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League of Filipino Students
Media Email: lfsphilippines.media@gmail.com
Website: www.lfs.ph

Mai Uichanco
Deputy Secretary-General
Mobile: +639277619716

Aki Merced
Media Officer
Mobile: +639322537600