Colmenares blames Duterte's 'red-tagging' for killing of NUPL founding member

Former Bayan Muna party-list representative Neri Colmenares on Wednesday blamed President Rodrigo Duterte's red-tagging or branding of human rights workers as communists in the killing of lawyer Ben Ramos.

Ramos, a founding member of the National Union of People's Lawyers (NUPL), was killed by motorcycle-riding men on Tuesday night in Negros Occidental. 

"President Duterte, you are a lawyer. You know you cannot be attacked on the basis of the clients you chose to represent. Your red tagging has led to the death of Atty. Ben. This has got to stop," Colmenares, a former NUPL president, said in a statement.

Ramos was one of the lawyers helping the families of the nine farmers killed in Sagay, Negros Occidental, last month.

"Ben was a colleague and a friend. When human rights lawyers themselves are attacked, where can victims of human rights violations go?" Colmenares said.

Prior to Ramos' death, Duterte blamed the massacre to communists rebels, saying the victims were recruits of the insurgents and were killed to discredit his administration.

Ramos' death makes him the 34th lawyer killed under the Duterte administration per the records of the NUPL. Considering the situation, Colmenares has challenged the Supreme Court to intervene.

"Lawyers should not be attacked for the exercise of their profession. I ask the Supreme Court to step in and hold the perpetrators to account," he said.

'Reign of terror'

Bayan Secretary General Renato Reyes, for his part, said Ramos' killing proves the prevailing state of impunity in the country.

"There is a reign of terror when unarmed farmers and people's lawyers can easily be gunned down in the dark," he said in a separate statement. "We join the growing cry for justice for the many who have died in Negros over the past months."

“We stand together with the human rights and farmers groups fighting for justice," Reyes added, as he called for justice for Ramos and the nine slain farmers. —Llanesca T. Panti/KBK, GMA News