Bayan Muna solon afraid of evidence on links to communist group —AFP spox

The Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) on Monday said it was not surpised that Bayan Muna party-list Representative Carlos Zarate declined their offer to dialogue on the recent raids of the offices of militant groups.

In a statement, AFP spokesperson Brigadier General Edgard Arevalo speculated that Bayan Muna Representative Carlos Zarate must have declined their invitation out of fear of the evidence that the AFP will present to him.

“We surmise that they would not want to be confronted with mounting documentary and testimonial evidence that shall establish what we have been saying all along about communist terrorist groups,” he said.

The AFP earlier said the raids of the offices of Kilusang Mayo Uno, Gabriela Negros Center, Negros Federation of Sugar Workers, and Bagong Alyansang Makabayan are legal.

Last Thursday, 64 members of the House signed a petition to end the “crackdown” on progressive groups, some of which are represented by Makabayan lawmakers.

“We nonetheless make our continuing offer for people and organizations who genuinely desire to know why we in the AFP assert that ‘red-tagging,’ ‘vilification,’ ‘crackdown,’ ‘planting of evidence,’ among the many terms they used, are merely for purposes of propaganda are meant only to court sympathy,” Arevalo said. —Julia Mari Ornedo/LDF, GMA News