Filipino delegates seek Canada's help to end killings

BY ANDY BLATCHFORD

andy.blatchford@transcontinental.ca

Filipino human rights activists visited a Beaconsfield church recently with a message they hope will hit home in the West Island.

The four-person delegation descended on Beaconsfield United Church March 8 to raise awareness about extrajudicial executions in their Southeast Asian country.

Workers Assistance Centre director Jose Dizon says more than 800 innocent people have been killed in the Philippines since 2001 and the country's government has done little to investigate the crimes.

Many of the victims were religious workers, indigenous farmers, and journalists.

"We are here because we want to tell our stories to the whole world," said Dizon, a Catholic minister in the Philippines. "One thing that is common among all of (the victims) is that they are all critics of the government."

Group members are seeking international help on a tour that will take them to cities in Canada, the U.S. and Europe.

The mission is sponsored by several Canadian church groups of different faiths.

"(Canadians can) ask their own government to come out strongly against these political killings because it's a threat to life and a threat to democracy," he said.

With Dizon, the delegation includes a physician, the general secretary of the National Council of Churches in the Philippines and the general secretary of Karapatan, a Filipino human rights organization.

The United Nations Human Rights Council's special rapporteur, Phillip Alston, is expected to finalize a report on the killings in the coming months.

Dizon hopes Alston's work will shine a light on the murders, and the Filipino government's alleged inaction, to the world.

"We hope the Canadian representative to the (UN Human Rights) Council will support that report and join us in asking the UN to delete the Philippines from its membership in its human rights council," he said.

Beaconsfield United's Reverend Shaun Fryday said his congregation is passionate about the delegation's cause.

"They're murdering church workers, they're murdering church leaders and they're murdering clergy," he said.

The delegates met with Lac St. Louis Liberal MP Francis Scarpaleggia last week.

"They're sensitizing people to this situation and asking religious and political leaders around the world to bring attention (to it) and bring their government to bear on the situation somewhat," said Scarpaleggia, who was not aware of the killings.

During the 40-minute meeting, Scarpaleggia promised to write a letter to Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay.

The killings are a concern for Canada, but the government is waiting for the UN report, a Foreign Affairs Ministry spokesman said last week.

"Canada has been following this issue very closely and the Canadian representatives raised our concerns with Filipino officials at all levels," Bernard Nguyen said.