Nuncio Filoni to see Bohol “killings” in its investigations

BOHOL initiated investigations into the extra-judicial killings would soon get to Papal Nuncio Fernando Filoni and his team of 15 ambassadors responding to the government's invitation to investigate. This as President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo reaped criticism over apparent inaction to stop alleged extrajudicial killings. The reported killings here, which were personally handed by Governor Erico Aumentado to the Melo Commission would then be scrutinized again by the independent team. Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita also said the envoys would be given a copy of what he called the preliminary findings of the Palace-formed Melo Commission into the extra-judicial killings.

This is over the militant organizations insistence that the killings of Liezelda Estorba, Nestor Arinque, Victor Olayvar and Olympio Crame have been perpetrated to silence them from criticizing government. The claims have been earlier refuted as police and government investigators found other motives behind the killings. The Filoni led team of 15 envoys from the Vatican , Sweden , The Netherlands, Germany , Finland , Australia , Italy , Austria , the Czech Republic , France , Switzerland , New Zealand , the European Commission, Romania and Canada comes at a time when Task Force Usig head has to be relieved to focus on another job.

The Department of Interior and Local Governments (DILG) relieved Police Dir. Gen. Avelino Razon, for Chief Superintendent Geary Barias, head of the Directorate for Investigation and Detective Management. Razon denied the movement has something to do with the investigations he led. Usig has been criticized by left-leaning groups for its alleged inability to stop the killings. It has claimed that 115 militants have been killed while 26 journalists have been murdered since President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo took her oath in 2001. Military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Bartolome Bacarro said AFP chief of staff General Hermogenes Esperon Jr. briefed the envoys on the killings and the military's counterinsurgency operations.

Sec. Eduardo Ermita, Foreign Affairs Secretary Alberto Romulo, Military Chief General Esperon Jr., Defense Secretary Hermogenes Ebdane Jr., and military commanders received the envoys in Camp Aguinaldo recently. "Everyone wants a briefing on the results of the Melo Commission…We thought that maybe we should give them an overview of the overall insurgency situation so that they'll get this, extra-judicial killings can be taken on the context of the whole," Ermita said. After its initial refusal, Malacañang has agreed to give foreign human rights investigators copies of the Melo Commission report. However, it says it will continue withholding the report from the Philippine media and public.

"The Armed Forces of the Philippines commits itself to collaborate and cooperate with the ongoing inquiries particularly on allegations that the armed forces is behind the series of unexplained killings," Bacarro said. Quoting Esperon, Bacarro said: "We will leave no stone unturned in our investigation and we will spare no one regardless of rank and position." Last week, Esperon gave a similar briefing to a United Nations team led by special rapporteur on extra-judicial killings Philip Alston, who is in the country to investigate the bloodshed, also in response to the government's invitation.

Alston, who met with Esperon and a police task force tasked to investigate the killings last week, will brief the media on their findings at a news conference in Makati City early Wednesday morning. Left-wing militants have blamed security forces for most of the more than 800 cases of extra-judicial killings in the country since President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo came to power in January 2001. But the government and state security forces maintain that most of the killings are the offshoot of a supposed internal purge within the ranks of the communist rebel movement. One such killing was a hit by the Republican Proletariat Army-Alex Bongcayao Brigade, which the break-away group owned through a web posted message.

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