Please Email, Phone or Write Today In Support Of Tortured Filipino Anarchists

Please take a minute to email, phone, fax, or write in sup­port of The Saga­da 11, young anar­chists false­ly accused of a Maoist gueril­la attack and tor­tured in The Philip­pines. Today, Novem­ber 17th is an inter­na­tion­al action day for them! A sam­ple let­ter and con­tact details for offi­cials fol­low this short descrip­tion of the back­ground to the case…

BACKGROUND
On Feb­ru­ary 14th this year, a group of anar­cho-punks from across the Philip­pines aged 15–25 were on a trip to Saga­da, a well known hik­ing spot, to go walk­ing. Police stopped the vehi­cle they were hitch­hik­ing with and bru­tal­ly arrest­ed them with­out a war­rant. Lat­er, they were told of an attack by Maoist gueril­las on a mil­i­tary out­post a few days before. When they denied involve­ment, they were sub­ject­ed to fur­ther tor­ture includ­ing suf­fo­ca­tion, elec­tro­cu­tion, sim­u­lat­ed exe­cu­tions and drown­ing. The two youngest had to be released, but the 9 oth­ers have been charged with arson and mur­der.

The youths were all active in eco­log­i­cal cam­paigns and groups such as Food not Bombs, but there is no evi­dence of any con­nec­tion with any Maoist organ­i­sa­tions, or gueril­la groups, or any evi­dence for the crime. Their arrest was ille­gal. They are being held under ter­ri­ble con­di­tions with­out even basic neces­si­ties or enough food in over­crowd­ed cells.

Inter­na­tion­al sol­i­dar­i­ty could make a huge dif­fer­ence to this case. You can say you are phoning/writing about the Saga­da 11, men­tion their names, and that you would like to enquire about their welfare/you think the arrests were illegal/demand their imme­di­ate release, etc. Please remem­ber that they are being accused of being part of Maoist gueril­la actions so be care­ful what you asso­ciate them with any­thing polit­i­cal­ly.

QUICK CONTACT DETAILS
Fil­ipino police: Gen. Arturo Lumibao: 0063 27264361
Jail:see address below, phone num­ber: 0063 744222304
Fil­ipino Embassy: 0207 9371600, Fax: 020 79372925, Email: embassy@philemb.co.uk

Oth­er impor­tant email address­es to send to: rvpuno@dilg.gov.ph, chiefacosta@edsamail.com.ph, sechbp@infocom.com.ph, drpvq@yahoo.com, omb1@ombudsman.gov.ph, ssyed@ohchr.org, tb-petitions@ohchr.org, scronin@ohchr.org . The full con­tact details are giv­en after the sam­ple let­ter but you can copy this email list to make mail­ing eas­i­er…

SAMPLE LETTER

I recent­ly heard about a case involv­ing eleven young peo­ple arrest­ed, tor­tured and false­ly accused of a ter­ror­ist attack in The Phillip­ines…

Names of those still in jail:

1. Run­dren Berloize Lao (24) of Gerona, Tar­lac.
2. Ander­son Alon­zo (18) of Cali­nan, Davao City
3. Aldoz Chris­t­ian Manoza (18) of Sam­paloc St.,
San­tolan, Pasig City
4. Ron Pandi­no (20) of Barangay May­at­ba, Siniloan,
Lagu­na
5. Jethro Vil­la­gra­cia (21) of Cali­nan, Davao City
6. Neil Rus­sel Bal­a­ja­dia (25) of No. 026 Tawiran St.,
San­tolan, Pasig City
7. Dar­win Ala­gar (21) of Barangay Tipu­so, Urdane­ta
City, Pan­gasi­nan
8. Arvie Nunez (21) of Barangay Silan­gang Mayao,
Luce­na City
9. Jef­fer­son dela Rosa (20) of No. 211 A.M. De Leon
St., San­tolan, Pasig City
All of them are present­ly detained in a jail in La
Trinidad, Benguet.

Name of minor vic­tims released to their parent’s
cus­tody:

1. Frencess Ann Bernal (15) of Calumpang, Marik­i­na
City
2. Ray Lester Men­doza (16) of Blk. 157 Lot 32 San
Fran­cis­co St., Barangay Rizal, Makati City

Name of per­sons charged with tor­ture: Gen­er­al Vil­lam­or Bumanglag, provin­cial direc­tor of the Benguet Provin­cial Police Office (BPPO); Police Super­in­ten­dent Brent Mad­ja­co, head of the 1604th Police Provin­cial Mobile Group (PPMG) and his men; and uniden­ti­fied mil­i­tary agents and Cafgu mem­bers

It has come to my atten­tion that the 11 per­sons, who were arrest­ed and sub­se­quent­ly tor­tured by the police and mil­i­tary men on 14 Feb­ru­ary 2006, have filed anoth­er crim­i­nal charges before the Benguet Prosecutor’s Office on June 28. In the new com­plaint, the vic­tims charged the police and mil­i­tary offi­cials for arbi­trary arrest and deten­tion. As you are aware, the Region­al Tri­al Court (RTC) in La Trinidad, Benguet had already ruled on May 19 that the arrest of the 11 vic­tims was ille­gal.

I am deeply con­cerned that the prosecutor’s office may fur­ther delay in resolv­ing this new com­plaint of arbi­trary arrest and deten­tion. I am aware that pri­or to the fil­ing of this com­plaint, on March 31 the vic­tims had also filed for vio­la­tion of Repub­lic Act 7438 against the same respon­dents. No for­mal charges have yet been filed against them in court. It is report­ed that the Office of the Deputy Ombuds­man for the Mil­i­tary and Oth­er Law Enforce­ment Office have yet to act on the rec­om­men­da­tion made by the prosecutor’s office. Only until the Ombuds­man takes action to the rec­om­men­da­tion of the pros­e­cu­tors the case will make progress in court.

Also, the admin­is­tra­tive case filed with the region­al office of the Nation­al Police Com­mis­sion (Napol­com) is also drag­ging at their office. The Com­mis­sion has yet to com­mence its sum­ma­ry hear­ing of the admin­is­tra­tive com­plaint that the vic­tims also filed on July 20 and 21, despite a long hia­tus between its orig­i­nal com­plaint filed to them. The delay to resolve the case on part of the Com­mis­sion and Ombuds­man is seri­ous­ly
affect­ing this case. I am deeply con­cerned this sit­u­a­tion may pro­long unless act­ed upon while the vic­tims remained in jail.

I am deeply con­cerned that charges of rob­bery with homi­cide, which was re-filed by the police­men against the 11 vic­tims, after the court’s rul­ing that the 14 Feb­ru­ary 2006 arrest and deten­tion of the vic­tims was ille­gal could be a mere rehash. I am extreme­ly dis­ap­point­ed that the vic­tim­s’ alle­ga­tions that the con­fes­sion and evi­dence tak­en from them by way of tor­ture, which the police used pros­e­cut­ing them, have not been act­ed upon. To my under­stand­ing, the suc­ceed­ing proceeding–filing of the case–should have been sub­se­quent­ly declared as null and void as the arrest have already been declared ille­gal. I there­fore urged the court, to con­sid­er these cir­cum­stances in their future delib­er­a­tion.

I urged your appro­pri­ate inter­ven­tion to ensure that the com­plaints the vic­tims filed to the pros­e­cu­tors’ office, ombuds­man and the police com­mis­sion are act­ed upon prompt­ly. I believed that you would com­plete­ly agree that prompt­ness to resolve these cas­es is very essen­tial. Please also request the prosecutor’s office in Benguet to con­sid­er drop­ping the charges of rob­bery with homi­cide against the vic­tims re-filed by the police con­sid­er­ing giv­en the court’s rul­ing. If this can­not be done, please request the court to con­sid­er approv­ing the victim’s peti­tion for rein­ves­ti­ga­tion.

Rein­ves­ti­ga­tion is nec­es­sary in order that the alle­ga­tions of tor­ture are dealt with accord­ing­ly.

Addi­tion­al­ly, please request the con­cerned gov­ern­ment agen­cies, in par­tic­u­lar the Philip­pine Nation­al Police (PNP) and the Armed Forces of the Philip­pines (AFP) to con­sid­er­ing dis­man­tling the armed mili­tias they are utilizing–Civilian Aux­il­iary Force Geo­graph­i­cal Unit (CAFGU). The uti­liza­tion of Cafgu had already result­ed to abus­es. In this case, CAFGU mem­bers had been accused of tak­ing part in the ille­gal arrest and deten­tion. The gov­ern­ment must send a strong mes­sage against the use of this force.

I trust that you will take action on this case.

Yours sin­cere­ly,

FULL CONTACT DETAILS

1. Mr. Ronal­do V. Puno
Chair­man
Nation­al Police Com­mis­sion (Napol­com)
A. Fran­cis­co Gold Con­do­mini­um II
EDSA cor. Mapagma­hal St., Dil­i­man
Que­zon City
PHILIPPINES
Voice: +63 2 925 0330 / 31
Fax: +63 2 925 0332
Email: rvpuno@dilg.gov.ph

2. Mrs. Per­si­da V. Rue­da-Acos­ta
Chief, Pub­lic Attor­ney Office (PAO)
DOJ Agen­cies Build­ing,
NIA Road East Avenue
1104 Que­zon City
PHILIPPINES
Tel. No. +63 2 929 9010 / 9436
Fax No. +63 2 927 6810 / 926 2878
Email: chiefacosta@edsamail.com.ph

3. Direc­tor Gen­er­al Oscar Calderon
Chief, Philip­pine Nation­al Police
Camp Gen­er­al Rafael Crame
Que­zon City
PHILIPPINES
Tel: +63 2726 4361/4366/8763
Fax: +63 2724 8763

4. Atty. Joce­lyn Castil­lo
Region­al Direc­tor, Com­mis­sion on Human Rights
Cordillera Admin­is­tra­tive Region
3rd floor SSS Baguio Branch Bldg., Har­ri­son Road
2600 Baguio City
PHILIPPINES
Tel: +63 074 619 9088/ 074 619 9089

5. Mr. Raul Gon­za­lez
Sec­re­tary
Depart­ment of Jus­tice
DOJ Bldg., Padre Fau­ra
1004 Mani­la
PHILIPPINES
Fax: +63 2 521 1614
Email: sechbp@infocom.com.ph

6. Ms. Purifi­ca­cion Quisumb­ing
Com­mis­sion­er
Com­mis­sion on Human Rights
SAAC Bldg., Com­mon­wealth Avenue
U.P. Com­plex, Dil­i­man
Que­zon City
PHILIPPINES
Tel: +63 2 928 5655 / 926 6188
Fax: +63 2 929 0102
Email: drpvq@yahoo.com

7. Mr. Orlan­do Casimiro
Deputy Ombuds­man for the Mil­i­tary and
Oth­er Law Enforce­ment Offices
3rd Floor, Ombuds­man Bldg., Agham Road
Dil­i­man (1104) Que­zon City
PHILIPPINES
Tel: +63 2 926 9032
Fax: +63 2 926 7572
Email: omb1@ombudsman.gov.ph

8. Pro­fes­sor Man­fred Nowak
Spe­cial Rap­por­teur on the Ques­tion of Tor­ture
Attn: Mr.Safir Syed
OHCHR-UNOG
1211 Gene­va 10
SWITZERLAND
Tel: +41 22 917 9230
Fax: +41 22 9179016 (ATTN: SPECIAL RAPPORTEUR ON THE QUESTION OF TORTURE)
E‑mail: ssyed@ohchr.org, tb-petitions@ohchr.org
9. Mr. Lean­dro Despouy
Spe­cial Rap­por­teur on the inde­pen­dence of judges and lawyers
Attn: Sonia Cronin
Room: 3–060
OHCHR-UNOG
1211 Gene­va 10
SWITZERLAND
Tel: +41 22 917 9160
Fax: +41 22 917 9006 (ATTN: SPECIAL RAPPORTEUR INDEPENDENCE JUDGES & LAWYERS)
E‑mail: scronin@ohchr.org

For more info, http://www.brightonabc.org.uk