Human rights lawyers have asked the government to investigate the alleged involvement of the military in the deaths of four members of a peasant family in Negros Occidental last June 14. In a statement, the National Union of Peoples’ Lawyers (NUPL) claimed there has been “no investigation for the horrendous killings of peasant spouses Rolly Fausto, 55, Emelda Fausto, 50, and their sons Ben, 15, and Ravin, 12, in Sitio Kangkiling, Brgy. Buenavista, Himamaylan City.” NUPL said “the culpability of military units operating in the area must be immediately probed, both for the massacre and the previous harassments and ill treatment inflicted upon the Fausto spouses.” “Victims of such atrocities are also urged to explore other national and intranational remedies in other States such as possible legal sanctions on specific security forces,” it said. It also said: “The perpetrators have done it before and will definitely do it again. Allowing them to go unpunished will reinforce their feeling of invincibility and further foster impunity.” The NUPL said that spouses Fausto were members of a local peasant organization called Baclayan, Bito, Cabagal Farmers and Farmworkers Association (BABICAFA). But, it said, “the AFP (Armed Forces of the Philippines) has claimed that Rolly was a military asset killed by the NPA (New People’s Army) while assets of the NTF-ELCAC (National Task Force to End Local Armed Conflict), particularly a fake rebel returnee, have called for the arrest of human rights defenders conducting a fact-finding mission on the multiple murders.” Citing report, NUPL said that the couple “were subjected to threats, harassment and torture at the hands of the military in the months leading to their gruesome deaths.” It added that the photographs of the remains of the slain family members “show signs of mutilation.” At the same time, NUPL said that based on reports Emelda was interrogated by soldiers on March 22, 2022 before the uniformed men “proceeded to search the house before slaughtering their chickens.” It said that also on March 22, 2022, Rolly was forcibly taken by the military, beaten and coerced to admit being a member of the NPA and reveal the identities of other members. It also said that “Emelda reported two more incidents of illegal searches of their hut in April and May.” “These incidents occurred in a highly militarized area where state forces conduct regular patrols and military operations pursuant to Memorandum No. 32, under which additional forces of the AFP and the PNP (Philippine National Police) have been deployed in Negros, Bicol, and Samar purportedly ‘to suppress lawless violence and acts of terror.’ Under the counterinsurgency campaign Oplan Sauron, scores of peasants were killed in Negros Oriental within a six-month period in 2019,” the NUPL said. “The militarization in Negros, thus, continues to engender bloody killings to curtail the exercise of freedoms for the advancement of the rights of peasants, farmers, and agricultural workers as well as their longstanding advocacy for genuine land reform,” it also said.