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'Inhumane' transfer of jailed mother and newborn hit


Militants scored on Thursday what they called the "inhumane" transfer of a member of the "Morong 43" group of detainees and her three-week-old infant son to a police camp in Taguig City. The handling of detainee Judilyn Oliveros and her baby, who were transferred from the Philippine General Hospital (PGH) in Manila to Camp Bagong Diwa in Bicutan in Taguig City, was “cruel" and “too much," Bayan secretary general Renato Reyes Jr. said. Oliveros, a first-time mother, gave birth by Caesarian section at the PGH on July 22, and had been nursing her baby son under guard. "Oliveros was led out of the Philippine General Hospital on a wheelchair and in handcuffs. She was not able to carry her baby on the trip during the transfer," the Bayan leader. The Bayan leader called on President Benigno Aquino III to review the case of the Morong 43, noting that another member of the detained group is due to give birth in October. "Another 'Morong 43' detainee, Mercy Castro, is scheduled to give birth in October. The longer the cases against the 43 are not reviewed, the more it becomes possible for the fate of Oliveros and her son to be repeated," Reyes said on the Bayan website. Various local and international groups have maintained the Morong 43, who were arrested last February 6 in Morong town in Rizal province on suspicion of being communist rebels, were health workers. Lawyers of the 43 filed a petition for Oliveros's release on recognizance to allow her to breastfeed her son for at least six months. State Prosecutor Romeo Senson opposed the petition, but Justice Secretary Leila de Lima expressed support for the non-separation of Oliveros from her son, and ordered the withdrawal of Senson's motion. Morong Regional Trial Court Judge Gina Escoto, however, denied the petition of Oliveros's lawyers. Bayan urged the Morong RTC to reconsider its decision of sending Oliveros and her child back to jail, and insisted that mother and child should be “released on humanitarian grounds." Reyes also said the transfer of Oliveros and her son to Bicutan “highlights the urgent need" for the government through its DOJ to review the cases filed against the Morong group and release all 43 detaines “because the charges against them are false and the arrests made were illegal." Earlier during the day, the visiting hours in Camp Bagong Diwa was suspended following a noise barrage by women detainees, in protest of the court’s decision on Oliveros and her baby.—Jerrie M. Abella/JV, GMANews.TV

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