Palace smears Filipino UN experts for 'embarrassing' Duterte admin

MANILA, Philippines — Don’t embarrass the Duterte administration.

That was Malacañang’s message to two Filipino United Nations special rapporteurs, who warned the Philippines of they called the “massive” impact of military operations on the human rights of indigenous people in Mindanao, which has been under martial law but which has also been militarized for decades.

President Rodrigo Duterte placed the restive region of Mindanao under martial law in May after ISIS-linked militants took over the principal Islamic city of Marawi.

With 240-27 vote at a joint session, it took Congress less than half a day to approve Duterte’s request to extend martial law in Mindanao until Dec. 31, 2018 to defeat jihadist militants and communist rebels operating there.

In a statement dated December 27, UN special rapporteurs Victoria Tauli-Corpuz and Cecilia Jimenez-Damary said the ongoing militarization in Mindanao has “massive and potentially irreversible” effect on the rights of some Lumads or indigenous peoples.

READ: UN warns Philippines over 'massive' impact of military ops on Lumads in Mindanao

Corpuz and Damary are the UN Human Rights Council’s special rapporteurs on the rights of indigenous peoples and internally displaced people.

According to the pair, they had information suggesting that 2,500 Lumads had been displaced since October, and that Lumad farmers had been killed by military forces in South Cotabao on December 3.

“We fear the situation could deteriorate further if the extension of martial law until the end of 2018 results in even greater militarization,” the UN experts said.

Responding to the UN warning, presidential spokesperson Harry Roque claimed Corpuz and Damary were using their position to “embarrass” the Duterte government before the international community.

Roque, until recently a human rights advocate, said the two special rapporteurs should have had documented the cases of alleged rights abuses against the Lumads, and brought these cases “to the proper authorities” instead of making a public statement.

Roque claims partisanship

Noting that the two UN experts were elected to their post during the Aquino administration, the Palace spokesman then advised Corpuz and Damary to “be more circumspect on their statements,” saying their remarks “appeared to be very partisan.”

“So I appeal to these two Filipinos who albeit are special rapporteurs... not to use their post for the purpose of embarrassing the Duterte administration,” said Roque, who was a human rights lawyer before joining Duterte’s Cabinet.

But Corpuz had raised IP issues even during the Aquino administration.

In 2015, Corpuz and Michel Forst, UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders, urged the Philippines to launch an investigation into the killings of three human rights defenders in Surigao del Sur.

At that time, the experts’ call was endorsed by the UN Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, Christof Heyns.

One of the slain rights defenders was the director of the Alternative Learning Center for Agriculture and Development, a school providing education to indigenous youth who live in the mountains and service communities in the CARAGA region.

The murder happened immediately after members of the Philippine Army and alleged members of paramilitary forces occupied the school’s function hall as well as its grounds, and after members of the paramilitary detained the director.

Two other representatives of the Manobo community protesting against human rights violations, mining operations and land conversions, were shot in front of their community members by alleged paramilitary forces.

The UN experts said that following the killing, the military blocked access of indigenous communities from spending long periods of time needed for tilling in the mountains where their farms are located.

The communities were also denied access to the sacred burial sites also located in those mountains.

“Military occupation of civilian institutions and killing of civilians, particularly in places such as schools which should remain safe havens for children from this type of violence, are unacceptable, deplorable and contrary to international human rights and international humanitarian standards,” Corpuz and Forst said in 2015.

“We urge the Philippines authorities to ensure that such investigation into these tragic events be carried out independently to identify and bring perpetrators to justice,” they added.

Early this month, advocacy group PAN Asia Pacific reported that the Philippines recorded the highest number of killings related to land conflicts and struggles in 2017 amid a government crackdown on rural communities.

RELATED: Army restricting Lumad evacuees' access to aid, Alcadev says

Government ready to defend martial law

On Thursday, the Palace said it was ready to face the Supreme Court to defend Duterte’s extended martial law powers across Mindanao, after opposition lawmakers challenged the prolonged declaration before the tribunal.

In seeking for an extension of martial law, Duterte cited, among others, heightened guerilla attacks following the collapse of peace talks with the Communist Party of the Philippines, which he declared as a terrorist organization together with the communist party's armed wing, the New People’s Army.

Duterte’s move to tag the CPP and NPA as terrorists had raised concerns among activists in the national democratic movement that legitimate organizations could be targeted as supporters of terrorism.

”We fear that some of these attacks are based on unfounded suspicions that Lumads are involved with militant groups or in view of their resistance to mining activities on their ancestral lands,” Corpuz and Damary said without giving further details.

Membership in or support of a national democratic activist organization is not the same as joining the CPP or its armed unit.

Duterte earlier threatened to bomb Lumad schools that he said were run by communists to influence the youth to rebel against the government.