Thank You Message from Melissa Roxas…

Dear Friends of Melissa Roxas,

We are sending this to you on behalf of Melissa Roxas because you either expressed concern over Melissa’s abduction and torture in the Philippines last month or she provided email addresses of her friends she wanted updated now that she is back in Los Angeles.  If you are hearing about Melissa’s ordeal for the first time, we provided links after her thank you message below.

Please feel free to share this email to those that know Melissa.

Sincerely,
Friends of Melissa Roxas
friendsofmelroxas@gmail.com

***

Dearest Friends,

The recent birth of my niece reminds me that life is something more than just presence, it is the earth rising inside of you, the earth that has been there since the beginning, but taking a different form.

I started to think about all the other babies I had seen as a community health worker in the Philippines before my niece was born. The marking of before and after, beginnings and endings. I remember their mothers taking them in for health screenings and basic check ups. Infants who went untreated for days with a fever, the softness in their eyes gives way to a hardness, their skin was tight from dehydration, they were so tiny, their hand in mine was as little as my thumbnail. I remember how much I wanted them to get better and be alive. With so many babies, children and families that I’ve met, I realized that the disease they had was more than an epidemic of typhoid fever, cholera, or malaria, it was the disease of poverty and oppression.

When I started to work more with particular issues of human rights violations I also met different babies, babies and children who had lost their mothers and fathers to a different death. A horrible and preventable death that takes the life not only of its victim, but robs the whole family and the world of their presence, all because they advocated and fought for a better world where their children have genuine freedom, a just peace, and true democracy.

Philippines: Revolutionary Option

Story Location: http://www.bworldonline.com/BW062609/content.php?id=143

Philippines: Revolutionary option

“Whether one sympathizes with it or not, the fact is that this revolutionary movement is present and exerts significant political influence. It continues to challenge the ruling system and regime in power at every turn and raises the possibility of overturning the crisis-ridden system one day and introducing a radically different alternative…”

June 26, 2009 | MANILA, PHILIPPINES
BusinessWorld Online – Quezon City,Philippines

By Carol Pagaduan-Araullo

AFP Chief Gen. Victor Ibrado recently admitted that the military is having difficulty meeting the deadline imposed by de facto Commander-in-chief Gloria Arroyo three years ago, to end the decades-old communist insurgency in 2010. (Philippine Star, June 22, 2009). This was after he and his predecessors had repeatedly boasted that the military was on track in achieving the defeat of the New People’s Army (NPA).

The lame excuse is that the armed guerrillas “are just crisscrossing borders and transferring to another guerrilla front” even when the AFP had already allegedly “dismantled” the political and military infrastructure of numerous rebel fronts.

One need not be an expert on military strategy and tactics to know that guerrillas by nature employ flexibility and shifting tactics. This is a guerrilla movement’s way of dealing with the overwhelming superiority, in terms of numbers and weapons, of the state’s armed forces. Instead, it uses the favorable physical and social terrain in the countryside — i.e., the rugged mountains and remaining forested areas as well as the support of the rural populace — to conduct its revolutionary warfare.

Time and again ruling regimes announce the impending demise of armed revolutionary movements in much the same vein and for the same reasons that they belittle the democratic protest movement. The aim is to conjure strength and stability, to foist the illusion of popular acceptance if not support, because government is supposedly undertaking reforms that address the causes of armed conflict and mass protest actions.

Deceptive propaganda works up to a certain point, given government resources and numerous levers to manipulate, if not control, the mass media. But reality always catches up and the truth becomes so glaring that the regime’s minions are compelled to eat their words and offer the lamest of excuses or persist in the most egregious of lies.

Day of Action: Junk the VFA, Justice for the Abducted

**Please forward widely**

DAY OF ACTION AGAINST THE VISITING FORCES AGREEMENT

10 years of the VFA = 10 years of military occupation, abductions, and rape

Wednesday, May 27, 2009

PROTEST and Meeting with the Philippine Consulate General

3:30pm

@ the Philippine Consulate [**note location change**]

447 Sutter Street, San Francisco

Teach-In on the VFA

6pm

@ SOMCAN

1070 Howard Street (c/s: 7^th Street)

San Francisco, CA
Both events featuring special guest speaker Senator Francis “Kiko” Pangilinan and representatives of BAYAN-USA, GABRIELA USA and NAFCON-Norcal

In the wake of the abduction of Filipino American human rights advocate and health worker Melissa Roxas and her companions Juanito Carabeo and John Edward Handoc, please join BAYAN-USA and GABRIELA USA as we condemn the US-Philippines Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA) and demand justice for victims of abduction and all human rights violations with an action and educational forum on the 10th anniversary of the VFA’s ratification.

The Only “Change” We See Is the Change Being Pocketed by the Philippine Government to Rape and Terrorize the Filipino People—BAYAN-USA

FOR MORE INFORMATION ON THE CASE GO TO: Another ‘Nicole’: Filipina Accuses US Marine of Rape; Case Heightens Junk-VFA Call – Bulatlat

(Fact Sheet on the case at the bottom of statement)

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Rhonda Ramiro, secgen@bayanusa.org
May 14, 2009 www.bayanusa.org

Vanessa, her back to the cameras, narrates her plight during a press conference on Thursday. (Photo by Ayi Muallam/Bulatlat.com)

Gabriela’s Emmi de Jesus (left) and lawyer Evalyn Ursua both say Vanessa’s case strengthens the argument against the Visiting Forces Agreement. (Photo by Ayi Muallam/Bulatlat.com)

The Only “Change” We See Is the Change Being Pocketed by the Philippine Government to Rape and Terrorize the Filipino People—BAYAN-USA

Appalled by the double-news of the rape of another Filipina woman by a U.S. Marine and the increase in U.S. financial aid to the corrupt Philippine government, BAYAN-USA reiterated its call to terminate the U.S.-Philippines Visiting Forces Agreement (“VFA”), which the alliance of 14 Filipino American organizations in the U.S. sees as the red carpet used to usher in U.S. troops, supplies, and military training linked to thousands of human rights violations.

Under the auspices of the VFA, over 6,000 US troops were deployed to the Philippines this past April, to engage in so-called Balikatan (“shoulder-to-shoulder”) military exercises.  In a press conference today, the 22-year-old Filipina “Vanessa” (not her real name) told the story of how she was raped in a hotel room on April 19 by a U.S. Marine, registered in hotel records as “from Joint U.S. Military Assistance Group/Balikatan.”  According to the women’s group GABRIELA, Vanessa has decided not to file a case against her alleged rapist though there is evidence to support her claim.

“We are outraged that another Filipina has become the victim of U.S. troops, and that the VFA is blocking her from obtaining justice,” said BAYAN-USA Secretary General Rhonda Ramiro.  “Last month’s acquittal of convicted rapist Lance Corporal Daniel Smith signals that U.S. military personnel can get away with the most heinous crimes on Philippine soil because they will be protected by the VFA.”

Alston’s New Report Gives Fil-Ams Justification to Ramp Up Pressure on Philippine Government

For Immediate Release

May 8, 2009

Reference: Katrina Abarcar, Katarungan: Center for Peace, Justice, and Human Rights in the Philippines katarungan@comcast.net

Professor Philip Alston

Justice for Rebelyn Pitao!

Alston’s Upcoming Report Gives Filipino-American Human Rights Advocates Justification to Ramp Up Pressure on Philippine Government

Washington, DC – Recent news that Philip Alston, UN Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial Executions, believes the Philippine Government has failed to institute the substantive reforms he recommended to address extrajudicial killings and other human rights abuses in the country is the evidence that US Congress needs to strengthen the past conditions it placed military aid to the Philippines.

According to Katrina Abarcar, Coordinator of Katarungan: Center for Peace, Justice, and Human Rights in the Philippines. “In fact, we have basis to demand all US military aid and training to the Philippines be cut until the widespread problems extrajudicial killings, enforced disappearances, illegal arrests and politically motivated prosecutions of activists is indisputably solved.”

LFS Music Break! “I Want You” by Caroline Calderon

First off, we would like to thank all of you who came and supported the 7th Annual Diwang Pinay! We were proud to support and showcase many of our community’s talented artists. It’s important that we help cultivate and provide a space for our artists to present their skills to the community, while educating ourselves on the important issues we face. With that said, for this music break, we’d like to show one of this weekend’s performers. Props to Caroline and the many talented folks who performed Sunday! Hopefully we’ll get to see you perform again soon! And support independent artists!!!

GABRIELA USA Denounces US-Philippine Collusion in the Acquittal of a High-Profile Military Rape Case

For Immediate Release
April 23, 2009

Reference: Raquel Redondiez, Chair, GABRIELA USA, 415-244-9734

GABRIELA USA Denounces US-Philippine Collusion in the Acquittal of a High-Profile Military Rape Case

Filipina-Americans in the United States express our disgust and anger at the news that the Court of Appeals in the Philippines has acquitted Lance Corporal Smith in the 2005 rape case of “Nicole.” Lcpl. Smith was convicted of raping “Nicole” on December 4, 2006, and legalities around custody and sentencing has been ongoing for the past three years. Due to the highly contentious Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA), Smith has been in the custody of the U.S. Embassy instead of a Philippine prison. However, on March 12 of this year, a questionable recantation by “Nicole” was released while in the same month, monetary compensation and the termination of her legal counsel casted doubt on who prepared the content of the affidavit.

In this long and dirty case, US and Philippines collusion through loopholes in the VFA have demonstrated that in the Philippines, the rule of law and justice are commanded by American interests and corrupt politicians. The Court of Appeals has failed Filipino women worldwide. Instead of holding Smith accountable of rape, the appellate court has repealed the justice that was already rightfully won by “Nicole” and her family. After years of struggling and fighting with huge and broad support from Filipino organizations like GABRIELA in the Philippines and worldwide, Smith’s acquittal from his legitimate conviction in 2006 is a betrayal to both Nicole and her loved ones, but also to all of the Filipino women, children and men who have been victims of sexual assault and crimes by US military servicemen.