Philippines, at least seventeen land defenders killed in 2023: judicial intimidation and forced disappearances by the Manila government

MILAN (AsiaNews) – At least 196 climate activists were killed in 2023. Land defenders, most of them from indigenous communities, were murdered for opposing environmental exploitation in their country. A reality documented by the international organization Global Witness which recently published its report for last year. And which specified that the actual number of murders could be higher than the one recorded.

Most of the murders in Colombia. Most of the killings occurred in Latin America, with Colombia in first place. While in Asia, the Philippines continues to hold this sad record, with 17 activists killed in 2023. India follows, with five people killed, and Indonesia, with three.

Monitoring started in 2012. Numbers that can also be read as a whole starting from 2012, when Global Witness has begun monitoring. The number of land defenders killed in the Philippines in the last 11 years has risen to 298 (in Colombia there are 461), 86 in India, and 20 in Indonesia. Since 2012, there have been 468 murders of environmental activists in Asia, compared to 116 in Africa, most of which occurred in the Democratic Republic of Congo. In global terms, 36% of murders were committed against indigenous people.

Non-lethal attacks on activists on the rise. Global Witness stresses, however, that non-lethal attacks on human rights defenders have become common in the Philippines. According to theAsian Forum for Human Rights and Developmentjudicial pressure is the most used tool between 2021 and 2022 across the continent, with 1,033 cases recorded. Another common practice in the Philippines is enforced disappearance, a phenomenon that is also spreading to other countries in the region. “The abduction of land and environmental defenders in Southeast Asia has become a key issue, reflecting broader efforts by power holders to suppress dissent and maintain control over land and resources,” he said. Global Witness.

Fishermen against the construction of an airport. Jhed Tamano and Jonila Castro, 22 and 23-year-old environmental activists, both from the Manila Bay area, where they have supported local fishing communities against land reclamation projects for a new airport, said they were kidnapped on September 2, 2023. The kidnapping lasted 17 days and the Philippine military is suspected to have been involved.

Forced to confess to being “communist rebels”. After their release, the government, led by President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., had organized a press conference, which, however, according to the activists, was a “setup.” “The government, our kidnappers,” they said, “had organized it so that we could publicly confess that we were communist rebels, even if we were not. They had given us a couple of pages with the ‘official’ story and the answers they expected us to give. Instead, we told the truth.”

The work and initiatives of volunteers. And the truth is that the two women were trying to raise awareness about the situation of fishing communities as volunteers (Jhed is a coordinator for the Episcopal Ecumenical Forum and Jonila is responsible for an organization called People’s Network for the Environment). “For a couple of weeks, we were sure that a handful of men were watching us and asking about us. One of them even took a picture of us without our consent,” explained Jhed and Jonila. When they were kidnapped, they immediately understood “that those men were military. They knew too much: they knew our families, our addresses.”

Accusations, threats and psychological torture. They were released after days of accusations, threats and psychological torture. They agreed to attend the press conference, knowing that telling their story would be dangerous. In December 2023, the Philippine Department of Justice filed charges against the two women for “embarrassing and discrediting the Armed Forces of the Philippines” during the press conference. A local court issued an arrest warrant, while the Court of Appeals rejected the request for protection against the two women, overturning an earlier Supreme Court ruling. And the defense systems against Filipino environmentalists in general.