A progressive group is pushing for the resumption of peace talks between the government and armed rebels while also calling on the police and military to cease its “reckless and indiscriminate” red-tagging of government critics.
Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan) secretary general Renato Reyes Jr. said in a Facebook post that the government must end red-tagging and instead “address the roots of the armed conflict.”
“Red-tagging is real. It endangers people. It has to stop. Now. This witch-hunt has become so brazen, totally disregarding laws, professional standards and the basic right to due process,” he added.
Earlier, the police and military included in its list of “communists and insurgents” a number of ordinary farmers, indigenous peoples, and workers. It also red-tagged artists, lawyers, doctors, Church leaders, and journalists.
Just recently, two lawyers and a doctor were killed in separate incidents after being red-tagged by State forces.
Aside from professionals, Reyes said that red-tagging “now also includes academic institutions whose academic freedom is threatened by military intervention.”
Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana announced last week the abrogation of the agreement between the University of the Philippines and the Department of National Defense (DND) that prohibits police and military presence inside UP campuses.
He defended the move by saying that the state university has become a “breeding ground” for communists and that the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) and its armed wing, the New People’s Army (NPA), have been recruiting students to join their cause.
“The red-tagging by State forces has spun out of control, targeting just about anyone that raises a critical voice against the regime or is somehow associated with schools and institutions that the regime disagrees with,” Reyes said.
He added that such activities by the police and military also “spawned a new extortion racket.”
Reportedly, extortionists would threaten victims that their names will be included in a list of communist-terrorists unless they pay up.
Reyes urged the Philippines to follow the 2008 recommendations of United Nations Rapporteur Philip Alston show said that the government “should immediately direct all military officers to cease making public statements linking political or other civil society groups to those engaged in armed insurgencies.”
“We call on all individuals, professions, institutions, and democratic forces, to stand up against the reckless and indiscriminate red-tagging that is happening now. We call on the people to unite against tyranny and against efforts to silence dissent,” the activist leader said.
Addressing the “root causes” of the armed conflict is important in achieving lasting peace in the country, Reyes said, pushing for the resumption of the peace talks that was first stalled in 2017.