NUPL: Military tortured Aetas in reprisal for soldier's death in clash with NPA

The military tortured two Aetas as a form of reprisal for the death of a soldier in an encounter with New People's Army (NPA) rebels in August last year, a human rights lawyer said Wednesday.

Josa Deinla of the National Union of Peoples' Lawyers (NUPL) said Japer Gurung and Junior Ramos were arrested as they and their families were fleeing a crossfire between soldiers and NPA fighters in Zambales last August.

A soldier died in the firefight.

"It appears that it is actually the practice of the military to torture, arrest and detain civilians in retaliation to the NPA," Deinla said in an interview on ANC.

"It so happened that these civilians were fleeing so it now became easy for them to just accuse them as being part of the NPA members who were also fleeing, allegedly, the place after the encounter," she said.

GMA News Online has reached out to the military for their comment but has yet to receive a reply as of posting time.

In September last year, 7ID Public Affairs Office chief Major Amado Gutierrez denied that the arrested Aetas were abused following the clash with the NPA. He said the military even brought the suspected NPAs to a doctor.

Gurung and Ramos were charged under Section 4(a) of the contested anti-terrorism law or "engag[ing] in acts intended to cause death or serious bodily injury to any person, or endangers a person’s life."

They were also accused of illegally possessing firearms, ammunition, explosives, and subversive documents.

Deinla said the military planted these objects.

"They have been consistently and vehemently denying the charges against them, the grenades and ammunition, and even the subversive documents planted in their possession, they have not seen them," she said.

She said the two do not know how to read and write.

When they affirmed a Supreme Court filing on their behalf, they used their thumb marks, "because they do not know how to sign," the lawyer said.

Gurung and Ramos, through the NUPL, have asked the SC to allow them to participate in the petitions challenging the anti-terrorism law. They said their personal experience of being charged under the law means they have actual, direct, and immediate interest in questioning it.

They said they and their families were tortured for six days.

"To extract a confession from [Gurung], the soldiers tied him up and repeatedly mauled him, placed him inside a sack and hung him upside down, suffocated him with a plastic bag and cigarette smoke over his head, and forced to eat his own feces," the lawyers said.

Gurung and Ramos are detained at the Olongapo City Jail. Trial dates have been set for February and March, Deinla said. —KBK, GMA News