Manila, Philippines, December 1, 2002
I don’t understand the declaration of the US, and recently the European Union, that Mr. Jose Maria Sison is a terrorist. I have not heard or read of any plausible reason for the declaration. Mr. Sison is believed to be the founder of the Communist Party of the Philippines, an organization that had been made legal by Philippine law. He is consultant of the negotiating panel of the National Democratic Front of the Philippines which have been talking peace with the Government of the Republic of the Philippines, and which wants the talks resumed as soon as possible on Sison’s advice. Considering these, how can he be a terrorist?
I am further confounded by the fact that it was the GRP itself, through the Department of Foreign Affairs Secretary Blas Ople, which lobbied for the European Council to declare Sison a terrorist, and the New People’s Army as a foreign terrorist organization. This, despite the absence of any legal definition of the term “terrorism” or “terrorist” or “terrorist organization” insofar as Philippine laws are concerned. My layman’s mind wonders how the NPA has become a “foreign” terrorist organization when it operates only here in the Philippines, its own land? It would be easier for me to call the American military that come and kill Filipinos as “foreign terrorists.”
The Bush administration has no regard for the sovereignty of other nations. In pursuing his “global war on terror”, the US is terrorizing the globe with its unilateral declaration of war. The US did it to Afghanistan; it threatens to do the same to Iraq, the latter for keeping “weapons of mass destruction” (WMDs). But isn’t America itself keeping WMDs, which are more powerful than any other WMDs in the world? US sees the speck in its brother’ eyes but does not notice the log that is in its own eyes! (Matt. 7:3)
Church leaders and churches need to call on all nations, especially the US, to abandon war as a way to peace. The US has to realize and stop its arrogance and hypocrisy, and avoid global condemnation!
BISHOP ELMER M. BOLOCON
Ecumenical Bishops Forum
UCCP 877 EDSA Quezon City 1101
Contact # 4123174