By ANTHONY IAN CRUZ
Malaya
February 2, 2008
US SECRETARY of State Condoleezza Rice will testify on February 13 before the US Congress on whether the Philippines has complied with human rights preconditions tied to this year’s military aid to the country, said a group of Filipino-Americans and Americans lobbying for sanctions against the Arroyo administration.
The news came just two days after the Philippines signed a $500,000 contract with Stuart Eizenstat of the Covington & Burling LLP to push Philippine interests in the US.
The Church-based Ecumenical Advocacy Network (EAN) said it will “submit several preliminary questions” for Sen. Barbara Boxer to pose to Rice on efforts of the Philippine government to comply with the recommendations of UN special rapporteur Philip Alston.
Alston, who visited the country last year to look into the human rights situation, has said extrajudicial killings in the country are distressingly high and the military appeared to be responsible for a number of them.
Boxer presided over a hearing of the Senate foreign relations subcommittee on Asia Pacific affairs which heard testimonies of Protestant bishop Eliezer Pascua and Karapatan secretary general Marie Hilao Enriquez, and which exposed before the US Congress the more than 800 extrajudicial executions under the Arroyo administration.
Enriquez said she would ask Rice “to expose the Arroyo government’s non-compliance with the recommendations of the UN special rapporteur and other conditions laid down by the US Congress.”
“We will also point out that instead of undertaking concrete measures to uphold human rights, to prosecute the killers, and to stop the anti-human rights military Operation Plan Bantay Laya, the Philippine government has chosen to hire a PR and lobby outfit,” she said.
According to EAN, Rice’s written report on the compliance of the Philippines “may not be available soon and may take months,” thus delaying the US funding bonanza which the group said is “being chomped at” by the Arroyo administration even before it is made available to the Philippines.
Presidential chief legal counsel Sergio Apostol told media last December that the government should confront the “leftist” lobby in the US, but Ambassador Willy Gaa said the lobby contract signed Thursday in Washington would prioritize the veterans issue.
The human rights preconditions tied to US military aid to the Philippines placed the country alongside Haiti, Guatemala, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Ethiopia and Congo which are widely perceived to be places where massive and widespread human rights violations continue to occur.
The bill signed by President George W. Bush last December 26 states that “Of the funds appropriated by this Act under the heading `Foreign Military Financing Program,’ not to exceed $30,000,000 may be made available for assistance for the Philippines, of which $2,000,000 may only be made available after the Secretary of State reports to the Committees on Appropriations” on three human rights preconditions: That the Arroyo government is implementing Alston’s recommendations; that the Arroyo government is implementing a policy of promoting military personnel who respect human rights, and is investigating and prosecuting military personnel and others who committed extrajudicial executions or other human rights violations; and that the Armed Forces is not engaging in acts of intimidation or violence against members of legal organizations who advocate for human rights.”
Last year, EAN mobilized the heads of various Protestant churches in the US, organized forums and undertook a lobby that resulted in the first human rights preconditions ever tied to US military aid to the Philippines since the downfall of the Marcos dictatorship.