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Gov’t hit over 38 health workers’ continued detention at military camp


Militant groups on Saturday accused the government of participating in the "scripted" move to keep the 38 of the 43 detained health workers in military custody despite a court order to transfer them to a regular custodial facility. Human rights group Karapatan or the Alliance For The Advancement Of People's Rights slammed both the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) and the Philippine National Police (PNP) for failing to settle the health workers' transfer. "It was the most cruel show in the land... these state security forces made a mockery of their own brand of law by executing the most cruel circus in the land," the group said, referring to the failure of transfer last Friday. The 43 health workers were arrested last February 6 in Morong town in Rizal province on suspicions of being members of the New People's Army. They were detained at Camp Capinpin in Tanay, Rizal - the base of the Army's 2nd Infantry Division. Karapatan claimed it was the military's intention to keep the detainees under its custody a little longer to give the PNP time to file a motion for reconsideration before the Regional Trial Court of Morong last Thursday. The court on Wednesday ordered the military to bring 38 members of the so-called "Morong 43" to the Custodial Center at the PNP in Camp Crame in Quezon City. Five of the workers will remain no longer be transferred and will stay in Camp Capinpin while undergoing a process to secure amnesty. The military did not immediately follow the court order until Friday morning, a day after the PNP filed a motion asking Judge Amorfina Cerrado-Cesar to recall the transfer order. When the Morong 38 were brought to Camp Crame on Friday, the PNP refused to take them in, saying it would first wait for the resolution of their motion for reconsideration before the Rizal court, and that its custodial center was already overcrowded with 141 detainees and could no longer accommodate an additional 38 inmates. The PNP said it could not afford to violate fundamental rights of the health workers against "subhuman conditions" in an overcrowded detention facility. Ultimately, after being brought to Crame, the 38 health workers were taken back to Camp Capinpin in Tanay, Rizal. "A closer look into the events of the past two days will show that these government entities – the Philippine Army and the PNP – have mounted a successfully-executed 'operation' of thwarting the long-overdue transfer of the political detainees," Karapatan said in a statement. Dr. Geneve Rivera of the Health Alliance for Democracy (HEAD), a group of health professionals and workers, said the military's attempt to transfer the health workers to the PNP was a mere "charade" to make it "appear… they are now abiding by the rules." She said that Friday's incident at Camp Crame showed the military's "consistent insincerity and defiance of due process." Rivera also slammed the PNP saying, "administrative considerations," such as space constraints in prison cells, was a lame excuse for refusing to take custody of the health workers. The two groups said it would be better to just release the health workers if the military and the police only plan on passing them around. "If there is no place where the Morong 43 political prisoners can be temporarily transferred, we therefore reiterate our call, free [them]," Karapatan said. – Mark Merueñas/LBG, GMANews.TV

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