The Philippine Star
Local human rights groups attending the 8th Session of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in Geneva yesterday asked the UN panel to compel the Philippine government to implement the recommendations of its special rapporteur.
In a statement, the Philippine Universal Periodic Review Watch (UPR) asserted that the conclusions of UN’s Special Rapporteur Prof. Philip Alston in his fact-finding mission in 2006 are a “stinging indictment” of the human rights record of the Philippine government and a “mockery of its continued membership in the UNHRC.”
In her oral intervention during the interactive dialogue, Marie Hilao-Enriquez, secretary-general of Karapatan and a member of the Philippine UPR Watch, said Alston’s basic conclusions do not speak well of the Philippine government, which is supposed to observe the highest standards of human rights protection and promotion.
Enriquez reported to the UNHRC the case of activist Jonas Burgos, who is still missing after over a year despite all the legal remedies his mother, Edita Burgos, has resorted to.
She also confirmed that the killings in the Philippines have not stopped, and that Karapatan has already documented 13 victims of unexplained killings and two victims of enforced disappearances for this year.
She added that hundreds are still becoming victims of displacement due to military operations.
Enriquez’s oral intervention followed the report of Alston. Her statement was supported by the Commission of Churches on International Affairs of the World Council of Churches, the Asian Legal Resource Center, and the International Association of Democratic Lawyers.
“We also urge the UNHRC to ensure that the Philippine government will actually honor its pledges and commitments to the UNHRC,” she said.
The Philippine UPR Watch lamented that the Philippine Mission at the meeting showed “open hostility” while allegedly issuing an “undiplomatic tirade” against Alston and his report.
The group also lamented that the Philippine Mission engaged in a “total reverse of public relations spin” in Manila despite what they described as “the vituperative language and aspersions cast by the Philippine Mission together with the reportedly 50-member government delegation on Prof. Alston.”
Meanwhile, the government has branded as “inaccurate, highly-selective and biased” the report of Alston, which included several conclusions on the spate of unexplained killings in the country, citing, for instance the counter-insurgency program of the government as one, if not the primary, reason for the killings.
In her response to the report, Philippine Ambassador Erlinda Basilio expressed the government’s disappointment over the outcome of Alston’s visit to the country during which he met with the President and was given free access to government officials and its critics.
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