Monday, March 03, 2008 Seares: This thing called impunity By Pachico A. Seares News Sense
ALONG with scores of journalists, judges, and lawyers from the Philippines and other parts of the world, I attended an international conference on “Impunity and Press Freedom” Wednesday to Friday last week.
Shadows of the country’s political crisis cast ominously close on us at the Makati Peninsula where it was held. (Yes, the same Pen where renegade soldier and elected Sen. Antonio Trillanes induced a standoff with government troops last Nov. 29.) But PPI’s Juan Mercado, Cebu KBP chairman Leo Lastimosa, Cebu Media Legal Aid’s Rose Versoza and I flew out before the anti-Gloria protest began.
Media-related
There were a few things about impunity I wouldn’t have known had I kept myself to reading the papers or visiting websites:
-- “Impunity” is still not understood by many people who see the serial murders and disappearances of journalists and political activists but don’t figure that the culprits not being punished is what makes the crimes more inhuman.
-- Confusion over which salvaging of a journalist is media-related is “no longer an issue.” Victim is (a) a journalist or (b) a media practitioner (referring to the block timer and other non-staff reporter or commentator). Ignored is the attack’s cause or motive, which is the criterion of the Cebu press.
-- And widespread concern over killing or kidnapping of journalists and political activists doesn’t extend to assaults on suspects of petty crimes.
More than 500 summary murders in Davao raised no alarm. Some 190 summary executions of snatchers and drug couriers in Cebu didn’t merit horrid look.
It seems the world has to pick the kind of impunity it abhors.
