In The Press

The Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) has committed "new forms" of human rights violations against children by labeling them "child soldiers," a report by a child welfare group said Friday.

 

CRC Executive Director Ma. Esmeralda Macaspac said the Philippine government uses the broad definition of ‘child soldiers’ in the Paris Principles to evade prosecution for violating children’s rights. Worse, she said, “Communities and people’s organizations branded as guerilla fronts by a paranoid regime become vulnerable to attacks and children are bound to be branded as ‘children associated with armed groups’ by virtue of being residents of these communities or children of members of such organizations.” Read more »

MUKHANG bata nga sila. Nagmamartsa, nasa pormasyon, matikas. Bitbit ang matataas na kalibre ng baril.

Ganito ang ipinakitang bidyo ni Lt. Col. Julieto Ando, tagapagsalita ng 6th Infantry Division ng Army, sa midya kamakailan bilang patunay daw ng pagkakaroon ng mga "batang mandirigma" sa MILF (Moro Islamic Liberation Front). Nakuha raw ang bidyong ito sa inabandonang kampo ni Kumander Umbra Kato sa Maguindanao. Read more »

I did some work with an NGO called the Children’s Rehabilitation Center (CRC) on my last visit to the Philippines in Oct 2007 to January 2008.  The CRC works with children who are victims of state violence.  This set of ten images will try to tell just a small part of their current story. As some of you may know, the Philippines is in pretty rough shape these days.  It’s current government is said by human rights groups in country and internationally to be guilty of severe abuses.  It was until last year the 2nd most dangerous place in the world to be a journalist (after Iraq). Read more »

ZAMBOANGA CITY, Philippines – Philippine human rights investigators on Tuesday began a probe of the air strike which killed seven civilians in the restive southern region of Mindanao.

Mosib Tan, municipal administrator of Datu Piang town, said members of the Commission on Human Rights are currently investigating the deaths of a farming couple and their five children.

MANILA, Philippines - A militant human-rights group chided the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) for continuing clashes in Mindanao even during Ramadan.

Karapatan called on both camps to stop hostilities and go back to the negotiating table despite the dissolution of the government peace panel by Malacañang.

MANILA, Philippines -- Women and children are most affected in the ongoing conflict in Mindanao as evacuation centers are lacking in facilities, adequate food, and medicines, and children continue to experience “psychological trauma,” a group said on Monday.

MANILA, Philippines -- Surface the "the disappeared." Stop the abductions. Pull the military out of the villages.

These demands -- not toys -- were on the Christmas wish list of children whose parents had been abducted by the military or whose families had been displaced by government operations against communist rebels in the countryside.

Arkibong Bayan covers the dialog with CHR.