The following is based on a communication written by the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights Defenders and other UN experts to the Government of the Philippines on 8 May 2023. The communication remained confidential for 60 days before being made public, giving the Government time to reply. Regrettably, the Government did not reply within this time frame. If a reply is received it will be posted on the UN Special Procedures communications database.
Since the communication was sent, the Regional Trial Court in the Province of Abra granted a motion to quash the rebellion charges on 11 May 2023, due to lack of probable cause. The court also ordered the quashing of all warrants issued against the seven human rights defenders. Unfortunately, the smears have continued. On July 10, a press release by the Anti-terrorism Council (ATC) designated Ms. Sarah Abellon Alikes, Ms. Jennifer Awingan-Taggaoa, Mr. Windel Bolinget and Mr. Stephen Tauli as “terrorist individuals”.
This is a shorter version of the original communication.
BACKGROUND
Topic: charges of rebellion, alleged smears and harassment against human rights defenders Mr. Florence Kang, Mr. Nino Joseph Oconer, Ms. Lucia Lourdes Gimenez, Ms. Jennifer Awingan-Taggaoa, Mr. Windel Bolinget, Mr. Stephen Tauli and Ms. Sarah Abellon Alikes, who all advocate for Indigenous peoples, land and environmental rights.
Mr. Florence Kang is a human rights defender, development worker and the Executive Director of the Ilocos Center for Research, Empowerment and Development (ICRED), a non-governmental organisation dedicated to disaster response, people’s empowerment and community development in the Ilocos region. Mr. Kang has facilitated numerous humanitarian projects for water systems, sustainable energy and disaster preparedness in communities of farmers and fishermen, especially during the COVID-19 lockdown. Since 2016, he has been red-tagged and harassed on several occasions.
Mr. Nino Joseph Oconer is a human rights defender and a community journalist for the Northern Dispatch, where has been reporting on human rights and peasant issues in the Ilocos since 2011. For years, he has been subjected to terrorist-tagging through social media platforms as well as various harmful information materials about him being circulated in the Ilocos region. A week before Marcos Jr’s inauguration in June 2022, he was harassed and stalked by plainclothes police officers who claimed he was a “risk to security”.
Ms. Lucia Lourdes Gimenez is a human rights defender and a researcher for the Cordillera Peoples Alliance (CPA), an alliance of over 300 Indigenous people’s organisations working in the Cordillera region. The CPA works to promote the human rights of Indigenous communities, and establish recognition of such rights, whilst also organising capacity-building trainings and seminars for Indigenous communities. Ms. Gimenez is specifically working with one of the CPA’s affiliate peasant alliances, Alyansa Dagiti Pesante Iti Kordilyera (APIT TAKO).
Ms. Jennifer Awingan-Taggaoa is a human rights defender, a member of the Limos Indigenous community and a researcher at the Cordillera Peoples Alliance. She was also one of the founding members of the Asia-Pacific Indigenous Youth Network, now Asia Young Indigenous Peoples’ Network (AYIPN). Her community is currently in opposition to the construction of five large dams along the Saltan River and its tributaries in Kalinga province. She and her family filed a complaint before the Commission on Human Rights Cordillera office last year in response to the series of documented harassment against her and her family.
Mr. Windel Bolinget is a human rights defender and belongs to the Kankanaey and Bontok Indigenous peoples. Since 2009, he has served as the Chairperson of the Cordillera Peoples Alliance (CPA) and prior to this, worked as part of the CPA’s Education Commission, subsequently assuming the role of Secretary General. Mr. Bolinget has worked to promote human rights and Indigenous peoples’ rights, and has also advocated against large-scale mining and dam projects in the region due to their negative environmental impact. Mr. Bolinget has previously been targeted in retaliation for his work. In 2006, he was included in a military hit list, along with other leaders of the CPA. In February 2018, he and other human rights defenders were included in a list submitted by the Department of Justice in a petition to proscribe the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) and the New People’s Army (NPA) as terrorist organisations. Their names were eventually dropped from the list due to lack of proof. In August 2020, he faced an alleged fabricated murder charge and in January 2021, the Cordillera Police Chief issued a ‘shoot-to-kill’ order against him. Despite the Court’s eventual decision to recall the warrant of arrest against Mr. Bolinget and the dismissal of the case in July 2021, the targeting of the defender has intensified, with many pages on social media branding him, his family and his colleagues as terrorists.
Mr. Stephen Tauli is a human rights defender and a member of the Cordillera Peoples Alliance (CPA). He has campaigned against different destructive projects along the Chico River that, if implemented, would negatively impact the Cordillera Peoples. This includes the proposed Saltan Dams and the Chico River Pump Irrigation Project. On account of his work, he has been subjected to red-tagging, harassment and surveillance. On 20 August 2022, he was allegedly abducted near the CPA office, illegally detained and beaten up before being found the following day. In his complaint before the Commission on Human Rights, Mr. Tauli alleges the perpetrators introduced themselves as implementing orders from the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC).
Ms. Sarah Abellon Alikes is a human rights defender and a member of the Cordillera Peoples Alliance. A member of the Igorot Indigenous people, Ms. Abellon Alikes has been working to support marginalised communities in Cordillera and the rest of Northern Luzon for years. She significantly contributed to the campaign and advocacy work of the Amianan Salakniban (Defend the North – Northern Luzon Minewatch and Human Rights Network), which provided support to the Nueva Vizcaya communities in their struggle to assert their rights against Oceana Gold’s destructive mining operations. Since 2017, Ms. Abellon Alikes has been subjected to complaints and trumped-up charges for arson, robbery, illegal possession of ammunition, homicide and International Humanitarian Law violation filed by the Armed Forces and the National Police in different courts. Charges were later dismissed due to lack of probable cause.
ALLEGATIONS
On 3 January 2023, the Office of the Provincial Prosecutor in the municipality of Bangued, Abra Province, issued a Resolution identifying Mr. Florence Kang, Mr. Nino Joseph Oconer, Ms. Lucia Lourdes Gimenez, Ms. Jennifer Awingan‑Taggaoa, Mr. Windel Bolinget, Mr. Stephen Tauli and Ms. Sarah Abellon Alikes as respondents in a criminal case for “rebellion”, under article 134 of the Revised Penal Code, alongside two alleged members of the New People’s Army (NPA). The resolution accuses the seven human rights defenders of taking part in an armed ambush on members of the Philippines Army on 27 October 2022 that resulted in the death of two soldiers and refers to them as “part of a larger armed group or organization operating in Abra and adjacent provinces within the Cordillera Region”. The resolution further alleges that the respondents “intend to overthrow and supersede the government”. The indictment states that the respondents were identified by soldiers who survived the ambush using pictures from the records of the Philippine National Police. The indictment denied the human rights defenders due process as they were not given the opportunity to answer the complaint before it was filed in court.
On 24 January 2023, a warrant of arrest for the seven human rights defenders was issued by a judge of the Regional Trial Court in Bangued.
On 30 January 2023, Ms. Jennifer Awingan-Taggaoa was arrested at her home in Baguio City by members of the Philippine National Police (PNP) and the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP). Only then was she informed of the ongoing case against her and the six other human rights defenders. Ms. Jennifer Awingan-Taggaoa was subsequently detained at the Abra Provincial Jail. Following her arrest, the remaining six human rights defenders went into hiding while their lawyers explored legal recourses. An urgent motion to exclude the names of the seven human rights defenders from the case information and to quash the warrants of arrest was submitted by the defenders’ legal counsel to the Regional Trial Court in Bangued on 2 February 2023.
On 7 February 2023, Ms. Awingan-Taggaoa was granted the right to bail, set at 100,000 PHP (about 1,700 euro), and was subsequently released.
On 16 February 2023, the court allowed the remaining six human rights defenders to post bail.
On 20 February 2023, the remaining six human rights defenders posted bail of 100,000 PHP each.
On 21 February 2023, the Police Community Affairs and Development Group (PCADG) Cordillera posted the official mugshots of Ms. Abellon Alikes, Mr. Tauli, Mr. Bolinget, Ms. Gimenez, Mr. Oconer and Mr. Kang on their official Facebook page. The post shared their personal information, including their age, marital status, occupation and personal address, and referred to them as being members of a “Communist Terror Group”. The post was taken down three days later after the matter was reported to the local police by the human rights defenders’ legal counsel.
One of the attorneys defending the seven human rights defenders was himself red-tagged through Facebook posts.
At the time of writing, the Urgent motion filed by the human rights defenders’ legal counsel to exclude their names from the case information and to quash the warrants of arrest has not been addressed by a judge. No hearing in the criminal case against them has been scheduled.
CONCERNS
In the communication, we express our deep concern at the criminal indictment of human rights defenders Mr. Florence Kang, Mr. Nino Joseph Oconer, Ms. Lucia Lourdes Gimenez, Ms. Jennifer Awingan‑Taggaoa, Mr. Windel Bolinget, Mr. Stephen Tauli and Ms. Sarah Abellon Alikes, which we fear may be in retaliation for their peaceful work on Indigenous peoples, land and environmental rights.
We also wish to express our serious concern regarding the red-tagging of some of the above mentioned human rights defenders by police officials on social media and the unfounded allegations that they are affiliated with armed groups, in apparent attempts to discredit their legitimate human rights activities. We are concerned that such allegations will not only denigrate their efforts to denounce human rights violations, but also the efforts of other human rights defenders and human rights organisations, contributing to a chilling effect on civil society and the ability to freely exercise the right to freedom of expression and freedom of assembly and association without fear of retaliation.
The red-tagging of human rights defenders by labelling them as “communists” and or “terrorists” and the portrayal of them and their work as a threat to national security, including through statements by police forces, both online and offline, is an issue of serious concern.
