PATH

Peace Advocates For Truth, Healing & Justice

What is PATH?

Peace Advocates for Truth, Healing & Justice (PATH) was formally organized in 2002, pioneering in its focus on human rights violations by a non-state armed group. Composed of torture survivors, families, relatives and friends of victims missing or executed during the anti-infiltration campaigns within the Communist Party of the Philippines-New People's Army (CPP-NPA) in the 1980s, PATH seeks truth and justice from the CPP-NPA and other Left blocs involved in the anti-infiltration campaigns. PATH believes that all non-state armed groups, including those not from the Left movement, should observe human rights in the conduct of their resistance against the State. Ultimately, PATH holds the State accountable as well for the purges, and for military atrocities during martial law and throughout successive administrations.

Goals & Objectives

PATH's goals and objectives are as follows:

1. Complete the documents of the cases of all victims during the purges and all those involved.

2. Organize a national community of human rights defenders and advocates composed of survivors, families, relatives and friends of victims during the purges.

3. Facilitate the healing of survivors as well as the families, relatives and friends of purge victims.

4. Conduct exhumations so that victims are given due respect and proper burial.

5. Conduct a comprehensive advocacy work. Its main components will be public information and campaign, solidarity-building and lobbying at the local, national and international levels.

6. Deepen and popularize the culture of human rights through artistic and popular education, productions and other cultural endeavors.

7. Come up with case studies of country experiences on the setting up of Truth and Justice Commissions and strive for the creation of a Truth and Justice Commission in the country together with other human rights organizations and individual human rights advocates.

7 Committees

Research & Documentation. Documents stories and produces a database of victims in aid of locating burial sites; conducts research to surface facts and circumstances of the purges; publishes materials as tools for justice campaigns; ensures confidentiality and security of records and files.

Recovery of Victims' Remains. In cooperation with the victims' kin, locates gravesites, retrieves the remains and arranges their proper burial; mobilizes the services of forensic experts and other professionals; initiates dialogues with the victims' families as well as with perpetrators.

Counseling & Therapy. Facilitates healing sessions that address the long-term trauma of surivivors and victims families; mobilizes professionals in the fields of psychology and psychiatry; builds support groups for victims and their families towards eventual closure.

Communications & Popular Education. Develops education programs, including theoretical materials and tools for reflection, that revolve around human rights and respect for human dignity; holds commemoration activities and builds memorials for the victims; develops external communications through publications and mass media.

Legal & Security. Leads in the initiation and pursuance of legal actions for victims; assist in the handling and protection of material evidence in coordination with the RVR Committee; conducts research on the possibilities of a Truth Commission; studies the implications of PATH's work on the peace negotiations between the Government of the Republic of the Philippines (GRP) and the CPP-NPA-NDF; and ensures lines with established institutions that will help strengthen PATH;

Arts & Culture. Produces musical compositions, literary works, plays, video documentaries, films, and other cultural works from the stories of survivors and victims.

Organizing & Advocacy. Reaches out to survivors and victims' families in different regions and encourages solidarity in their journey towards justice and healing.

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Tuesday, September 19, 2006

on the 2nd exhumation

This week on Probe

FORENSIC ANTHROPOLOGY, TORTURE, MURDER

And you thought it only happens in the movies. This Wednesday, PROBE will keep viewers at the edge of their seats as they join the journey of Cion and Estelita, two sisters who are in search for Luz, their sister who has been missing for the past 20 years.

In the 1980s, the New People’s Army purged its ranks of suspected deep penetration agents or DPAs. At the end of the almost ten-year “cleansing,” the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP)-NPA realized the error of its ways and released those in captivity. By then, thousands had already been sentenced to death without due process, had been brutally tortured and killed, and dumped in unmarked graves all over the country. While the CPP-NPA eventually admitted that they were wrong, they neglected to give the martyrs proper burial and to inform their families of the truth.

Probe tells the story of Cebu 13 – thirteen labor organizers who were active in the movement, suspected to be DPAs, and were executed in a span of a few months in 1985.

With the help of PATH, an NGO dedicated to returning these martyrs to their families, the two sisters fly to Cebu, make the perilous trek over two mountains to recover the remains of Luz and Lando, their sister and her husband. With the help of a team of forensic anthropologists, they discover what could have happened in the final moments in Luz’ and Lando’s lives.

Apart from all that, the two sisters are also on a mission to find Luz's son, who was entrusted to a NPA sympathizer 20 years ago. This nephew should be all grown-up by now and possibly ignorant of what fate befell his parents.

Luz and Lando, the sisters, the son: all are victims of a senseless killing spree that happened two decades ago. Will this be a reunion for the family? Join them in their journey this Wednesday, September 20, at 11 p.m. on ABS-CBN.

source---> Click me

posted by PATH @ 9/19/2006 02:34:00 PM

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