(We yield this space to the statement of Front Line Defenders, an international organization with the specific aim of protecting human rights defenders at risk, due to its timeliness. – Ed.)
WE CONDEMN the killing of human rights defender Zara Alvarez, who was shot dead by unknown assailants in Barangay Mandalagan, Bacolod City on Aug. 17. She was a legal worker for the human rights group Karapatan and the research and advocacy officer of Negros Island Health Integrated Program.
Zara Alvarez’ killing follows a pattern of violence and red-tagging of human rights defenders, a form of political harassment against activists in which authorities label them “communists” – a label which carries lethal consequences including extrajudicial killings. Just one week before Zara’s death, fellow human rights defender Randall Echanis was murdered in his home in Quezon City. Both activists had been among the at least 600 people the Department of Justice asked a court to declare as “terrorists” in 2018, although their names were subsequently removed.
A new anti-terrorism law puts human rights defenders at additional risk by making the Anti-Terrorism Council the principal law enforcer, and empowering it to designate individuals as terrorists.
There is virtual blanket impunity for the extrajudicial killings of human rights defenders in the Philippines, effectively amounting to state policy. As Karapatan secretary-general Cristina Palabay stated: “Zara has long been a target of military, police, and judicial harassment for her tireless and dedicated work in defending people’s rights. She had already been imprisoned for nearly two years for a now-dismissed murder charge from the military — and all of the threats that she had received were from State security forces. All fingers point to them as the perpetrators of this senseless, cold-blooded killing, which is unsurprising for a fascist regime that is strongly averse to the idea of upholding and defending human rights, and is actively and proudly engaged in violating human rights.”
In 2019, Front Line Defenders reported in its Global Analysis findings that 43 human rights defenders (HRDs) were killed in the Philippines, the second highest number globally. In the preceding two years, the Philippines ranked third highest in its numbers of killings of HRDs.
Civil society is calling for justice and truth. Zara’s killing signifies the continuing crisis of persecution of the human rights community, a message which must be challenged by an immediate, transparent, exhaustive and impartial investigation into her death.
