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Sunday, May 27, 2007
Army officer told to appear in Burgos case probe
MANILA -- The Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) has directed one of its officers to submit to an investigation by the Philippine National Police (PNP) in connection with the disappearance of peasant leader Jonas Burgos.
Police are also seeking warrants to arrest two military officers suspected in the killing of a Protestant pastor last year.
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AFP public information officer Bartolome Bacarro said Lieutenant Colonel Melquiades Feliciano is expected to appear in the coming days before the PNP-Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG) to shed light in the kidnapping.
CIDG officials earlier said they cannot locate Feliciano, the administratively suspended commander of the 56th Infantry Battalion (IB), despite assurances by the military that it was cooperating with the inquiry.
Two enlisted personnel of the 56th IB have already given their statements in connection with the kidnapping of Burgos, son of the late Malaya publisher and press freedom icon Jose "Joe" Burgos, who was snatched in a Quezon City mall last April 28.
The plate number of an XLT jeep impounded at the headquarters of the 56th IB in Norzagay town in Bulacan for an illegal logging case had been attached to a Toyota revo and subsequently used in the Burgos kidnapping.
Military officials earlier said the plate number went missing while the 56th IB went on training from November last year to March this year.
The Army compound had been taken over by the 69th Infantry Battalion under Lieutenant Colonel Edison Caga.
The XLT jeep was seized when Lieutenant Colonel Noel Clement was the 56th IB commander.
Clement had been replaced by Feliciano as the 56th IB commander when Clement was re-assigned as commander of the Army's Security Escorts Battalion last January.
Last week, military investigators have recommended an administrative admonition against Feliciano, Clement and Caga for the missing plate.
Meanwhile, the police filed a murder complaint with the chief prosecutor of Albay province on Friday naming the two - both army majors - and 10 other men, said police Director Geary Barias.
The accused men will have an opportunity to respond to the charges before the prosecutor decides if there is enough evidence to indict them, said Barias, who heads a task force investigating the killings of political activists.
On August 3, 2006, masked gunmen dragged Isaias Santa Rosa from his home in Albay and shot him dead, Barias said.
The body of a soldier was found near the slain Methodist pastor, apparently accidentally shot by the other gunmen during the attack, Barias said.
The dead soldier served under one of the two majors named in the complaint, police said.
Army spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Ernesto Torres declined to comment Saturday, saying he had no information on the murder complaint.
Santa Rosa was a member of the left-wing National Peasant Movement.
Preliminary reports from a government commission that investigated political killings last year and the UN special rapporteur on extra-judicial killings both concluded in February that Philippine soldiers were involved.
Military officials, however, pointed to communist rebels as responsible for most of the killings as part of an internal purge. (VR/AP/Sunnex)For more Philippine news, visit Sun.Star General Santos. (May 27, 2007 issue)
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