Today, on the eve of the observance of the 2009 Ampatuan Massacre, we condemn the pervading culture and climate of impunity in our country and the gross, systematic and brazen violations of human and people\u2019s rights. We decry President Rodrigo Roa Duterte\u2019s outright disregard for human rights and publicly presenting those concerned with human rights issues as enemies.<\/p>\n
We lament that justice for the victims of human rights violations remains elusive as hardly any of the perpetrators of extrajudicial killings, enforced disappearance, torture and other attacks on human rights have been made to answer for their crimes. The most notorious among them have even been rewarded with promotion or are transferred to other units to escape prosecution. Even those caught red-handed, like the two police officers involved in the killing of an anti-crime crusader in Oriental Mindoro, have been reinstated. Human Rights violators like the Marcoses, and even former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, have returned to the corridors of power.<\/p>\n
Thus, violations continue to be committed with impunity. Thousands, mostly from the urban poor, have been killed in the course of Duterte\u2019s drug war. Karapatan documented 98 victims of extrajudicial killings resulting from the government\u2019s counterinsurgency program, 59 of whom were human rights defenders. There have been 1,222 victims of illegal arrests and at least 420,000 victims of forcible evacuation and bombings.<\/p>\n
We deplore the state of impunity, which makes the Philippines notorious as the country with one of the highest levels of impunity according to the 2017 global impunity indices released by Universidad De Las Americas Pueblas in Mexico and the Committee to Protect Journalists.<\/p>\n
We call on the government to stop the extrajudicial killings, arbitrary arrests and detention, enforced disappearances, filing of trumped up charges, forced evacuation and bombing of rural villages, attacks against human rights defenders and schools, and other human rights violations which continue as brazenly to this day. We also call for the scrapping of government policies and programs that perpetuate impunity like the \u201cwar on drugs\u201d, \u201cwar on terror\u201d and Oplan Kapayapaan and re-channel the budget from these programs to basic social services.<\/p>\n
We affirm the commitment to continue the search for justice and peace, however arduous the path may seem. We demand the prosecution of those responsible for crimes against the Filipino people. We reject the militarist and repressive solution to social unrest and the armed conflict, and the drug problem. We call on the government to address the roots of the armed conflict, as well as the social ills confronting Philippine society.<\/p>\n
We call on the Filipino people to join the quest for justice by holding those responsible for these crimes against the people to account.<\/p>\n
We call on the international community to be in solidarity with the Filipino people in the movement to end impunity and the quest for justice in the Philippines and in the rest of the world.<\/p>\n
We believe that human rights are what make us human. They protect the dignity of every person. We will act unceasingly and with full determination to bring an end to the culture and climate of impunity that pervades Philippine society, as we work towards the full realization of basic rights and fundamental freedoms in our country.###<\/p>\n
November 22, 2017
\nUP Balay Kalinaw, Diliman, Quezon City
\nNote: Approved by the 250 participants of the 2nd National Conference to End Impunity<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Today, on the eve of the observance of the 2009 Ampatuan Massacre, we condemn the pervading culture and climate of impunity in our country and the gross, systematic and brazen<\/p>\n