Death of NPA leader another proof of Karapatan lies: AFP exec

Parlade, who is also Armed Forces Deputy Chief-of-Staff for Civil-Military Operations, scored on Karapatan secretary general Cristina Palabay, who aggressively fought for the release of the Morong 43 saying they were not NPA rebels but are health workers. (PNA File Photo)

MANILA – The death of a New People’s Army leader in a recent clash with government troops in Sorsogon is another proof that he is not a health worker contrary to claims of human rights group Karapatan when he was arrested along with 42 other suspected communists in Morong, Rizal in February 2010.

This, according to Major General Antonio Parlade, Jr, of the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict reacting to the death of Edwin Dematera @ Dupax, Deputy Secretary of Larangan 2, Komiteng Probinsya 3 of the NPA in the Bicol Region, who was killed in Sorsogon on June 12.

“Dematera is the 20th member of Morong 43 who was either killed or captured by government forces. He was arrested as Edwin Detera together with the Morong 43 in Feb 2010 and was released. He was arrested again as Edwin Dematera but released on bail in 2016. Last June 12, he no longer has an alibi,” he said on Saturday.

Parlade, who is also Armed Forces Deputy Chief-of-Staff for Civil-Military Operations, scored on Karapatan secretary general Cristina Palabay, who aggressively fought for the release of the Morong 43 saying they were not NPA rebels but are health workers.

“This is yet another proof of your lies about ‘your health workers’,” he said.

He added that they were NPA medics, 1 a machine gunner, and others were regular NPA fighters training as medics when they were captured by government forces.

This fake human rights advocacy of Karapatan, he added, and their persistent lies about Morong 43 as being health workers, forced the government to release 33 of the 43 in December 2010.

“Immediately after release they went back to the mountains,” he added.

Parlade said in just weeks after their release, six of them perished in several encounters with government troops in Laguna, Quezon, and Bicol, debunking Karapatan’s claim that they are not NPA members.

To show more proof about Morong 43, he added that on March 30, 2017, Lilibeth Donasco @Jo/Mok, was wounded in a fierce encounter with Army’s 203rd Brigade troops in Bulalacao, Oriental Mindoro and eventually died after four days,.

“Earlier, Emilia Marquez@Roxanne was arrested by troops in Calapan, Oriental Mindoro by virtue of several warrants. She is still in jail and is, in fact, complaining that Karapatan has abandoned her. She promised to reveal everything about Karapatan and other fake CPP front organizations in due time,” he added.

Emilia’s brother, Jovito Marquez @Busay, is also a Platoon Leader of NPA’s MRGU, Islacom in Mindoro.

“These lies would continue and in fact, these full-fledged scammers in the ranks of Karapatan continue to dupe some foreign funding organizations in Europe,” he said.

He said other donors have stopped but only after being exposed and Karapatan has since resorted to other means to dramatize the ‘alleged’ harassment by the government by running to the Supreme Court.

“We just celebrated our 121st Independence Day.

I wonder what flag these Karapatan members waived proudly in their safe houses,” he added.

In denial

“Meanwhile, five of them have admitted to being NPA members and are now enjoying their freedom back in the mainstream. One is the Party husband of Cheryline Cadapan, whom they (Karapatan) claimed to be a simple ‘barrio researcher’ and not an NPA member,” he said.

The CPP and its front organizations, he said, don’t want to refer to them as Morong 43 because they don’t want the public to be reminded that five of them actually admitted already to being NPA members shortly after they were captured.

Flashback

Parlade earlier said Franco Romeroso, a member of Morong 43 who died of a heart attack while in political detention at Batangas Provincial Jail on April 19, along with other captured NPA members were not tortured, harassed, or even sexually molested, contrary to Karapatan claims.

“They were treated properly and this was confirmed by the Morong 5, when they guested in Karen Davila’s Headstart show at ABS-CBN,” he said.

He said Morong 33 were not released because they were proven innocent but they were released as a gesture of goodwill during the celebration of International Humanitarian Law Day in April 2011.

“This distortion of facts by Karapatan has been established already. In hindsight, we now know that establishing this pattern of human rights, etc, even by fabricating reports like the ‘Lake Sebu Massacre ‘is necessary to keep Jose Ma Sison in Utrecht. Non-refoulement prevents a state from extraditing a person back to his country of origin if there is still a threat of state persecution,” he added.

Former NPA rebel Fr Conrado Balweg, he said, admitted in his video interview that they would get the uniforms of police and soldiers killed in an ambush and attack the community near the ambush area so that the community will blame the military for the violence.

“This perpetuated more violence, with people joining the NPA who dupe them to exact vengeance on the innocent military or police. The same violence was reported by Karapatan in the international community to seek support for a tyrannical Marcos government, then collect funds from European donors,” Parlade said.