Philippine Asian News Today Vol 20 No 18 | Page 8

8 OPINION
PHILIPPINE ASIAN NEWS TODAY September 16 - 30 , 2018

Tinig Migrante

By E . Maestro
A few weeks ago , the International People ’ s Tribunal ( IPT ) with its GUILTY verdict made international headlines . The IPT took place in Brussels , Belgium from Sept 18-19 to indict Presidents Duterte and Trump for “ crimes against the Filipino people .” The Tribunal was convened by the International Association of Democratic Lawyers ( IADL ), European Association of Lawyers for Democracy and World Human Rights ( ELDH ), Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers , IBON International , and the International Coalition for Human Rights in the Philippines ( ICHRP ).
The Filipino people at the suit of BAYAN , KMU , Migrante , GABRIELA , and nine other people ’ s organizations were the Complainants who filed charges against the Defendants President Duterte , the Philippine Government , President Donald Trump and the US Government , the IMF , World Bank , WTO , transnational corporations and foreign banks doing business in the Philippines . The charges were gross and systematic violations of human rights , i . e , civil and political rights , economic , social and cultural rights , the violations of international humanitarian law and the violations of the rights of the people to national self -determination and development .
The Tribunal found President Rodrigo Duterte and U . S . President Donald Trump responsible for human rights violations against the people of the Philippines . Experts and victims of human rights violations presented testimonies on poverty , homelessness , the “ drug war ,” political persecution , extrajudicial killings , the oppression of women and a range of issues .
The jurors of the IPT 2018 were Mamdouh Habashi , head of the International Office of the Socialist Popular Alliance Party in Egypt and Vice-President of the World Forum for Alternatives ( WFA ) in Dakar ; Monica Moorehead , cocoordinator of the International Working Women ’ s Day Coalition in New York City and an executive board member of the International Women ’ s Alliance ; Ties Prakken , professor of criminal law at Maastricht University and practices

The Guilty Verdict is Out !

criminal law and human rights ; Sarojeni R e n g a m , Executive Director of Pesticide Action Network Asia Pacific ( PA N A P ) ; A t t y . Azadeh N . S h a h s h a h a n i , prominent human rights lawyer , former President of the National Lawyers Guild ; Dr . Gianni Tognoni , Secretary General of the Permanent People ’ s Tribunal
: Tina Palabay , Secretary General of Karapatan testifying before the Tribunal ( PPT ); Roland witnesses are therefore also a serious indigenous peoples .” Weyl , founder and first Vice-President betrayal . On the contrary , he has persisted The Verdict also illustrated in all of of the International Association of with quite disturbing viciousness in the charges raised by the Complainants Democratic Lawyers , Dean of the Paris continuing previous governments ’ gross the role and complicity of Donald Trump , Bar ; and Rev . Michael Yoshii , Pastor of and wholesale violations against the et . al . -- their sanction of the methods the Buena Vista United Methodist Church
Filipino people .” used by Duterte in his drug war , financial
( UMC ) in California and Chairman of the The International People ’ s Tribunal assistance and support of Duterte ’ s
Advocacy & Justice Committee for the declared it quite clearly that “ In essence repressive measures against those critical
California Nevada Annual Conference of and practice , what Defendant Duterte has of its economic , political and military the United Methodist Church . done and continues to do is a genocidal policy , the military aid in terms of funding ,
The jurors wrote in their Verdict : war against the majority of exploited intelligence , training
“ The fact that Defendant Duterte was a sectors in the Philippines , especially the and arms , and the CONT NEXT PAGE president the people voted for , meant that the people had entertained the hope that they might expect a some [ what ] m o r e d e m o c r a t i c regime after years of crude d i c t a t o r s h i p . That hope of the people implied a moral obligation of D e f e n d a n t Duterte towards the people . The human rights violations that are proven by the different Banner of the International Peoples ’ Tribunal
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