US lawmakers determined to suspend US security aid to PH over issues on human rights

A group of US lawmakers is pushing to suspend US security assistance to the Philippines over alleged massive human rights abuses committed by the police and the military purportedly as part of the Duterte administration’s anti-terror drive.

Photo credit: nbcnews.com

Rep. Susan Wild from Pennsylvania authored and filed House Resolution 8313, or the Philippine Human Rights Act, which was co-sponsored by 23 other Democrat lawmakers, including Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

Philippine human rights groups welcomed what they called international pressure on the Duterte administration for its tyrannical policies.

Malacañang yesterday downplayed the filing of the resolution, with presidential spokesman Harry Roque calling it a very wild suggestion.

Wild and the 23 other United States filed the bill on September 17 and it had drawn support from several faith and civic groups in the United States.

A copy of the bill has yet to be uploaded to the United States House of Representatives’ website, but a summary says the bill would suspend the provision of security assistance to the Philippines until the government of the Philippines has made certain reforms to the military and police forces, and for other purposes.

Today, across the Philippines, Rodrigo Duterte’s brutal regime is using the pretext of a so-called anti-terrorism law to ramp up efforts targeting labor organizers, workers and political opponents. This law allows suspects to be detained by the police or military without charges for as long as 24 days and placed under surveillance for up to 90 days,

Wild said in a sponsorship speech, a video of which was played back during a news briefing on Thursday.

She emphasized that the “US will not participate in the repression” of Filipinos by security forces using the fight against terror as an excuse.

In response to these abuses, I introduced the Philippine Human Rights Act, which would block US funding for police or military assistance to the Philippines, outlining a series of basic criteria, which would have to be met in order to resume such funding,

Wild added.

The Philippines received $554 million in military assistance from the US from 2016 to 2019.

The conditions set in the bill for the lifting of the suspension of US security assistance to the Philippines include investigation and prosecution of the perpetrators of human rights abuses, withdrawing military from domestic policy and policing, protection of the rights of trade unionists, indigenous peoples, farmers, journalists and government critics; guaranteeing the capability of the judicial system in investigating and prosecuting erring members of the police and military.