NR0127:US' spy network operatives in Europe

Mula sa Tanggapan ni Anakpawis Rep. Crispin Beltran
News Release January 27, 2005
House of Representatives, South Wing Rm 602
931-6615 Ina Alleco R. Silverio, Chief of Staff
Email: paggawa@edsamail.com.ph, anakpawis2003@yahoo.com
Cellphone number 09213907362
Visit geocities.com/ap_news

Solon denounces European trip of GMA cabinet secretaries as a directive from
the US; says spy network already at work

Anakpawis Representative Crispin Beltran today said that the European tour of
Foreign Affairs Secretary Alberto Romulo, Presidential Adviser on the Peace
Process Teresita Deles and Presidential Chief of Staff Norberto Gonzales is
clearly on the behest of the United States government and the demands it is
making on the Macapagal-Arroyo administration. Beltran said that it was an
outrage that the Macapagal-Arroyo administration released thousands of pesos to
fund this European tour of its cabinet members for the purpose of forcing
National Democratic Front chief political adviser Jose Maria Sison to return to
the Philippines.

"It all ties neatly together, the way the US is establishing a comprehensive
spy network in the country and the renewed red-baiting campaign of the
Macapagal-Arroyo government. The intensifying interference of the US in the
country's political affairs is not really because the US is after terrorists
-- it's targeting the revolutionary and progressive forces in the Philippines
who oppose the economic crisis and the government's uselessness in solving it.
The US and the Macapagal-Arroyo administration are closely coordinating in a
plan to crack down on the growing protest movement and genuine progressive
forces," he said. "The renewed harassment against Jose Ma. Sison is a direct
command from the US government who sees Sison as a big thorn on its side. The
Philippine government is, in the meantime, ever willing to obey."

He said that there was an emerging pattern in the US' declarations and actions
when it comes to Philippine affairs.

"The political interference is directly connected to the economic and military
agenda of the US in the country. Already the Arroyo administration has succeeded
in ramming through eight regressive and anti-poor tax measures that are all,
without a doubt, prescriptions of the US-led International Monetary Fund
(IMF). Now, the moves are becoming more drastic as the US wants the
administration to completely scuttle the peace negotiations with the NDFP
and repatriate Sison who is a representative of the Filipino people's
struggle for liberation against US interference," he said.

Beltran said that not even the Dutch government or the European Union can force
Sison's repatriation because he is as a recognized political refugee and thus
protected by the Refugee Convention and by Article 3 and entirety of the
European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental
Freedoms.

He is also a complainant before the proper courts in charges against the Dutch
government and the European Council for violating his basic human rights in
connection with the "terrorist" listing started by the US and followed by the
Dutch government and the European Council.

"It's lamentable and a betrayal of the country's sovereign independence that
the Philippine government has stood idly by as the US declared Sison a
terrorist regardless of the fact that no single court in the Philippines has
laid down a single accusation against the man or declared him a criminal," he
said.

Beltran said that civil libertarians and all patriotic forces in the country
including congressional representatives and senators should oppose the blatant
interference of the US in the country's internal affairs. He said that they s
hould oppose the US' labeling of Sison, the NDFP, the Communist Party of
the Philippines and the New People's Army (NPA) as terrorist. "The US has
no right to declare leaders of a widely-recognized people'liberation movement
as terrorist."
#