LEGAZPI CITY – Families of the victims, Karapatan Bikol, Hustisya, and Desaparecidos reiterate the call to urgently and safely surface Felix Salaveria Jr., James Jazmines, and all victims of enforced disappearances, March 1.
It has been six (6) months since their reported abduction. Jazmines was abducted on August 23 in the evening while Salaveria was abducted on August 28 in the morning in Tabaco City, Albay and still missing.
They’re the 14th and 15th victims of enforced disappearances under the Marcos Jr. administration.
Holy mass was held at the St. John the Baptist Church in Tabaco City yesterday afternoon to raise awareness on the continuing disappearance of the two victims.
Meanwhile, attorneys from the Office of the Solicitor General attempted to evade the issue of state accountability through subterfuge at a hearing, February 28, at the Court of Appeals on the Salaveria family’s petition for writs of amparo and habeas data.
“Unable to deny the fact of the abduction because the act had been caught on CCTV, the state attorneys tried to raise doubts that it was Felix Salaveria Jr. who was abducted by harping on the fake IDs purportedly found in his house. These IDs, however, were merely cited and never presented to Salaveria’s daughters,” said Karapatan deputy secretary general Maria Sol Taule.
“Second, they even attempted to raise doubts that Felix Salaveria Jr. exists, by citing a problem in his birth certificate. The state attorneys failed in this tack, however, because Salaveria’s birth certificate and other identification documents were good enough to get him a Philippine passport and a US visa in the past and that he was actually able to travel to the US on his visa,” added Taule.
According to Karapatan, not a single government investigative agency has reached out to the Salaveria family to report on any development in their alleged probes six months after the abductions.
“State agencies are obviously playing a waiting game. They hope that in the course of time, the issue of Jazmines and Salaveria’s disappearances would blow over, and state forces would forever evade accountability,” Taule added.
Progressive groups in the Bicol region stand firm in holding the current regime responsible for the state-backed abductions of human rights defenders and demand accountability for these heinous violations of human rights.
