Sayyaf executioner still faces charges — DOJ

Charges will be filed against the Abu Sayyaf hostage who confessed he was forced to behead other captives of the bandits, Justice Secretary Hernando Perez said yesterday.

Perez explained that the matter of self-defense as claimed by the confessed executioner, alias "Jun," for committing the act would be up for the court to decide.

"Under the law, even a matter of self-defense is for the courts to decide. So the prosecutors will still conduct the investigation and still file charges and he should present his defense in court," Perez said.

He added that a justifying or exempting circumstance is a matter of defense that should be presented in court, not during the preliminary investigation.

He stressed that the Department of Justice (DOJ) should look into the evidence and file charges against "Jun," which would require him to present his evidence for defense in court.

"Jun" may invoke a provision in the Revised Penal Code which provides that "any person who acts under the impulse of an uncontrollable fear of unequal or greater injury" may be exempted from criminal liability.

The videotape showing "Jun" and other guerrillas beheading government soldiers was shown on television.

Meanwhile, National Security Adviser Roilo Golez has offered to resign if it will be proven that members of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) and not the Abu Sayyaf were involved in the beheading of hostages in Basilan in 1995.

"I am willing to put my career and life on the line if they can prove the MILF did the beheading," Golez told reporters at the weekly Balitaan sa Rembrandt Hotel in Quezon City.

He hurled the same challenge to opposition legislators who are questioning the authenticity of the video footage or insisting that the perpetrators of the grisly act were the MILF as this was the same footage shown by the Estrada administration to members of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) in 1999 to win their support for an all-out war in Central Mindanao.

Manila Archbishop Jaime Cardinal Sin, however, said yesterday he was not aware of any meeting where the footage of the violent beheading in the jungles of Basilan was shown to the bishops of CBCP. "If there was such a meeting, I was not present," he added.

The spokesman for the CBCP corroborated Sin’s statement, saying they do not recall ever seeing a video footage of any group executing hostages.

"Wala kaming natatandaan (We don’t recall anything)," said Msgr. Pedro Quitorio III yesterday in an interview with the press.

But in a separate interview with reporters, Ipil Bishop Antonio Ledesma confirmed that he had seen in the year 2000 during the Estrada administration a video footage of hostages being executed. He also confirmed that the group executing the hostages were the Abu Sayyaf and not MILF members.

The bishop said he has not discussed the video with CBCP president and Cotabato Archbishop Orlando Quevedo.

Abu Sayyaf rebels raided Ipil town in Zamboanga del Sur on April 4, 1995, in a rampage that left at least 54 people dead.

Sayyaf, not MILF

Defense Secretary Angelo Reyes also confirmed yesterday the video showed the brutal beheading activities of Abu Sayyaf members, not MILF rebels, on captured soldiers.

In a news conference at the Department of Defense at Camp Aguinaldo in Quezon City, Reyes also showed a copy of the manuscript of a military briefing conducted by the military for then President Joseph Estrada on June 4, 2000, when the video was also shown, which supported government claims that the perpetrators were indeed Abu Sayyaf members.

Reyes was also accompanied by Maj. Cirilito Sobejano, a former Army Scout Ranger operative who figured in a series of encounters with the Abu Sayyaf members who were shown in the controversial video footage.

"I recognize many of them (Abu Sayyaf members), including some of the soldiers they captured and later beheaded," Sobejano, a Medal of Valor awardee, said in an interview. "Some of the victims were even my friends."

Reyes also revealed that the original video tape was obtained by military officials from a Filipino overseas contract worker in Saudi Arabia.

"We received information that some individuals were spreading copies of the video in an effort to gain support from other international terrorist groups," Reyes said. "Some people were making money out of it."

At Malacañang, Presidential Spokesman Rigoberto Tiglao said yesterday it was up to the TV and media owners to decide whether to continue airing the controversial video.

He reiterated it was the decision of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) to release the footage to private TV networks but the decision whether to air them was not an imposition by the government.

"This government is very transparent," he said. "We try to make available all information that would help our people decide whether a policy is correct or not."

So far, Tiglao noted, informal surveys conducted by local TV stations showed an 8-1 ratio in favor of releasing the tapes for public viewing. He said the airing could change previous perceptions of the Abu Sayyaf as "brave mujahedeens" when indeed they are a "brutal and inhuman people."

President Arroyo has insisted that she had not instructed the release of the tape, although she backed its showing to the public. She said the people have the right to know: "The footage speaks the truth."

Tapes seized in MILF stronghold?

Opposition leaders claiming to be privy to the seizure by government troops of the taped beheadings have continued to blast the government for deceiving the public in saying the beheading was done by Abu Sayyaf.

Senators Vicente Sotto III and Edgardo Angara said the tape was among those seized by the military when government troops captured Camp Rajamuda, one of the MILF strongholds in Mindanao, during the early part of 1999.

They said Catholic Church leaders can attest to the fact that it was the same tape shown to them during the time of Estrada.

But Manila Archbishop Jaime Cardinal Sin, the most influential leader of the Catholic Church, and the bishops said they had not seen the footage.

Sin reiterated that he does not interfere in national issues of the government. "I have not advised the Arroyo administration or attempted to influence its decision regarding national issues like the Balikatan," he said.

At the same time, he stands by the decision of the CBCP on the Balikatan. "Archbishop Orlando Quevedo has spoken in his capacity as president of CBCP regarding the Balikatan issue. As a member of the conference, I follow whatever my brother bishops have agreed upon and pronounced," he said.

While not categorically saying that the CBCP backs the Balikatan exercise, Quevedo stated they support the help being given by the American soldiers to solve the Abu Sayyaf and kidnapping problems in the country.

Golez said those who are raising hell against the video are the same people who are conducting daily rallies against the ongoing Balikatan exercises in Zamboanga and Basilan provinces in the south.

He reiterated earlier government pronouncements the video was released to show to the world the real face of the Abu Sayyaf bandits. He also said that it took a while for the government to release the video because it was waiting for the "proper time" for its public exhibition.

Golez debunked claims that the video contained violent scenes not suitable for children. "Some of the video games played by children are even more violent," he pointed out.

He also expressed doubts on the claim of the self-confessed killer "Jun" that he did the beheading for fear of his life, saying that it could be possible that he was actually a member of the Abu Sayyaf who had come down from the hinterlands to live a new life.

"He could be a member of the Abu Sayyaf now living a quiet life, but when the video surfaced, exposing him, he had to make up a story to defend himself," Golez conjectured.

AFP also exploited minors

Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) Secretary Corazon "Dinky" Juliano-Soliman said the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP), like the MILF and the Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG), was guilty of exploitation of minors in past incidents in strife-torn Mindanao.

Soliman said the AFP itself was guilty of exploiting minors when they used children they had arrested for being MILF and ASG errand boys, couriers or informers, to be "double agents." In some instances, the AFP even employed children as errand boys.

It will be recalled, Soliman said, that the MILF had teen-aged recruits in their armies, a practice the DSWD had long complained of and opposed.

The ASG, on the other hand, has been reported to be using children in sympathetic villages as informers and errand boys.

Soliman urged the AFP and MILF to refrain from using children in the war they are waging in Mindanao and the ASG in their terror and criminal activities.

DSWD Undersecretary Lourdes Balanon the other day revealed that they have in their custody seven such children who were former ASG errand boys. She said the children are undergoing medical and psychological treatment and given food and shelter by the DSWD. – With reports from Perseus Echeminada, Rainier Allan Ronda, Sandy Araneta