Joma group liable for 141 incidents of APM use, task force says
The Armed Forces of the Philippines has recorded 141 incidents involving production, stockpiling, transporting and use of these banned anti-personnel mine by the communist New People’s Army, injuring or killing more than 30 civilians.
“Based on Intelligence information, the CPP-NPA-NDF has continuously produced, stockpiled, transported, and used these prohibited weapons with the blessing and approval of CPP leaders Jose Ma. Sison, Luis Jalandoni, Juliet De Lima-Sison and other CTG leaders, making them fully responsible and liable for the deaths of dozens of civilians, including Kieth Absalon,” Undersecretary Severo Catura, Executive Director of the Presidential Human Rights Committee Secretariat (PHRCS) and NTF-ELCAC spokesperson on human rights said.
Sison and other leaders of the CPP-NPA-NDF must be held accountable for the summary executions of Kieth and Nolven Absalon, even as families of the victims, civil society groups, human rights defenders, and peace advocates stood in solidarity in condemning the perpetrators, the NTF-ELCAC said yesterday.
“We are fortunate that we have a domestic law (RA 9851) that clearly effects our adherence to IHL. This law, signed in 2009, will weigh heavily on the charges against Sison et. al that will be filed in the country’s appropriate courts to exact accountability,” Catura added.
Section 10 of RA 9851 provides that “a superior shall be criminally responsible as a principal for such crimes committed by subordinates under his/her effective command and control, or effective authority and control as the case may be, as a result of his/her failure to properly exercise control over such subordinates.”
The NPA has c