Terror laws haven't ended terrorism, armed state against people: IPMSDL

By A Representative 

The International Indigenous Peoples Movement for Self-Determination and Liberation (IPMSDL) joined Indigenous Peoples, human rights defenders and civil society groups worldwide on July 3 in observing the Global Day of Action Against Terror Laws, using the occasion to criticize counter-terrorism legislation that it says has been used to suppress Indigenous communities and rights defenders rather than combat terrorism.

The day marked the sixth anniversary of the Philippines' Anti-Terrorism Act of 2020 (Republic Act No. 11479) and came a day after the conclusion of the United Nations' Global Counter-Terrorism Week, during which UN member states completed the ninth review of the UN Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy.

In a statement, IPMSDL Co-convener Beverly Longid said Indigenous communities continue to face arrests, prosecutions and financial restrictions despite two decades of global counter-terrorism initiatives.

"Six years of the Anti-Terrorism Act in the Philippines, twenty years of the UN's own counter-terrorism strategy and Indigenous Peoples are still burying leaders, still watching our organizations' bank accounts frozen, still on trial for organizing our own communities. These laws were never built to protect us. They were built to clear us out of the way of the mine, the dam, and the plantation," Longid said.

The organization argued that the Philippines' Anti-Terrorism Act, signed into law by former President Rodrigo Duterte on July 3, 2020, has been used to target Indigenous leaders, land defenders and activists. It also contended that similar legislation in other countries has enabled governments to criminalize community organizing and resistance to large-scale development projects.

IPMSDL noted that when the Anti-Terrorism Act was enacted, it faced 37 legal petitions before the Philippine Supreme Court and drew criticism from Indigenous organizations, the Bangsamoro Parliament, church groups and international human rights bodies.

The organization cited the 2023 designation by the Philippines' Anti-Terrorism Council of Cordillera Peoples Alliance (CPA) chairperson Windel Bolinget and CPA leaders Jennifer Awingan-Taggaoa, Sarah Abellon-Alikes and Stephen Tauli as alleged terrorists. According to IPMSDL, the designation resulted in the freezing of the organization's bank accounts and exposed the individuals concerned to arrest and detention under the country's anti-terror framework.

The group maintained that governments are increasingly relying on counter-terrorism and national security laws to facilitate mining, dam, energy and other extractive projects in Indigenous territories. It argued that Indigenous communities defending ancestral lands should not be treated as security threats.

IPMSDL called for the repeal of the Philippines' Anti-Terrorism Act, the abolition of the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC), and the review or repeal of comparable counter-terrorism and security laws in several countries, including India, Pakistan, Indonesia, Cambodia, Bangladesh, New Zealand and Australia, which it alleged have been used against Indigenous Peoples and environmental defenders.

The organization also demanded the immediate release or fair and speedy trial of political prisoners and rights defenders detained under terrorism and security laws for their advocacy.

Concluding its statement, IPMSDL said the defense of ancestral lands and the struggle for Indigenous self-determination should be recognized as legitimate rights rather than acts of terrorism.