News Release
December 16, 2013
Reference: Vince Casilihan
Cellphone number: 09481390488
“It is despicable for
a government to scurry on beefing up its fangs in the face of grinding poverty,
injustice, and discontent.” This is what Vince Casilihan of Karapatan-Bikol has
to say in reaction to the Aquino government’s plan on purchasing unmanned
aerial vehicles or drones to be used in intelligence and combat operations.
The Aquino government has provided P684 million to the
Department of National Defense for the acquisition of six drones for the
Philippines Marine Corps. The human rights group Karapatan-Bikol believes that
no later will the other branches of the Armed Forces of the Philippines follow
suit in employing drones in it’s counterinsurgency campaign. To this, Casilihan
criticizes Aquino’s “crooked” concept of addressing armed conflict. He said, “Here
is a warfreak of a government buying more weapons, instead of allocating public
funds to education, health, agricultural subsidies, and other social services –
whose dearth are among the legitimate grounds for waging armed opposition.”
