Aquino orders charges vs ‘Morong 43′ dropped
President Benigno Aquino III on Friday ordered the Department of Justice (DOJ) to drop all criminal charges against 43 health workers who were arrested in Rizal last February on suspicion of being New People’s Army (NPA) rebels engaged in bomb-making activities.
In a speech during the celebration of Human Rights Day, Aquino said his administration recognizes that the “Morong 43″ were denied the right to due process when they were arrested and charged with illegal possession of firearms and explosives.
“As a government that is committed to the rule of law and the rights of man, this cannot stand. Therefore, I have ordered the DOJ to withdraw the informations filed before the court. This will in effect, subject to court approval, free those among them who have no other standing warrants in other courts,” he said at the celebration of the 62nd Anniversary of the Universal Declaration on Human Rights.
He added: “Let this be a concrete example of how our administration is working in the broad light of day to build a country where the law protects us equally. The culture of silence, injustice and impunity that once reigned is now a thing of the past.”
Thirty-eight of the health workers are detained at Camp Bagong Diwa in Taguig City while the rest are still at Camp Capinpin in Tanay, Rizal.
The ‘Morong 43′ went on hunger strike last week (Dec. 3) for the immediate withdrawal of charges against them and their immediate release.
Anti-Torture Law
Friday’s announcement came after Aquino and other government officials signed the implementing rules and regulations of Republic Act No. 9745 or the Anti-Torture Law of 2009.
UN Coordinator to the Philippines Jacqueline Badcock said the Philippine government is now on the right track to reaching one of the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) in 2015.
In her speech, Badcock said the Philippines is the UN member-country to start “mainstreaming human rights in development planning,” referring to the government’s new Medium-Term Philippine Development Plan (MTPDP).
President Aquino did a first when he ordered the inclusion of the Commission on Human Rights in drafting the new MTPDP for 2010 to 2016.
Badcock said that the new human-rights-based MTPDP is “very relevant” in the country’s effort to meet its MDGs by 2015.
“The integration of human-rights-based approaches to MTPDP is a very good start,” she said, but urged the government to set in motion long-term efforts to intensify its human rights programs.
AFP’s rights-based approach
Commission on Human Rights (CHR) head Loretta Ann Rosales, meanwhile, said she is optimistic that the new military leadership will take a more rights-based approach in quelling the communist insurgency.
Rosales said that there is “a lot of goodwill and energy” on the part of the new sets of officials of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP). The military generals, she said, are now more open to ending insurgency through “political solutions rather than militarist solution.”
Rosales said that the Philippine National Police (PNP) has also started its human-rights-based transformation.
She also reported that CHR personnel are now busy giving seminars to government employees in the national and regional levels on how to integrate human rights in development planning.
News Source: ABS-CBN News
Photo Credit: marxistleninist
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