News rss

  • Arroyo urged: Stopping journalist murders could be your legacy

    24 March 2009

    A SOUTHEAST Asian journalists’ mission has called on the Arroyo government to intensify efforts to prosecute the killers of journalists and arrest the suspected masterminds in the 2005 killing of Mindanao journalist Marlene Garcia Esperat. “We are alarmed by the continuing killing of media workers in the Philippines and the inadequate measures the government is »Read More

  • Manila Peninsula journalists file appeal

    24 March 2009

    JOURNALISTS who were arrested, “processed” and detained during the Nov. 29, 2007 Manila Peninsula standoff filed Tuesday their brief before the Court of Appeals as they pursued their appeal on the dismissal by a Makati City regional trial court of their P10 million class action suit against government officials. The journalists said Judge Reynaldo Laigo committed »Read More

  • Marcelino challenges officials under probe to go on leave

    24 March 2009

    MARINE Maj. Ferdinand Marcelino, on detail with the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency, challenged Monday all government officials who are under investigation in connection with the “Alabang Boys” controversy to go on leave as a matter of delicadeza as he himself took a leave of absence following President Gloria Arroyo’s order to have him investigated for »Read More

  • Mikey Arroyo confirms meeting JDV on charter change

    21 March 2009

    PRESIDENTIAL son and Pampanga congressman Juan Miguel “Mikey” Arroyo confirmed the meeting with former Speaker Jose de Venecia during which they discussed charter change, the Philippine Star reported Friday. Star sought Arroyo’s reaction to a VERA Files report that he and Leyte Rep. Martin Romualdez sought in late February to enlist De Venecia of Pangasinan’s »Read More

  • Resado faces bribery raps for ‘Alabang Boys’ resolution

    20 March 2009

    PRESIDENT Gloria Arroyo has ordered the filing of bribery charges against State Prosecutor John Resado, who is accused of having been bribed by the “Alabang Boys” to get them off the hook following their arrest by agents of the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency last September for drug pushing. Resado wrote the Dec. 2 resolution dismissing »Read More

  • New Mancao affidavit tags Estrada, Lacson in Dacer slaying

    20 March 2009

    FORMER police Senior Superintendent Cezar Mancao has implicated former president Joseph Estrada and Sen. Panfilo Lacson in the November 2000 kidnap-murder of publicist Salvador “Bubby” Dacer and his driver Emmanuel Corbito, the Philippine Daily Inquirer reported Friday. The Inquirer, quoting from Mancao’s Feb. 14, 2009 affidavit executed in Florida, also reported that Lacson ordered Mancao »Read More

  • Trillanes calls final baseline bill a ‘sell-out’

    9 March 2009

    DETAINED Sen. Antonio Trillanes IV on Monday called the approval of the final version of the Senate bill on the country’s baseline a “sell-out.” The Senate approved the bicameral conference committee report classifying Scarborough Shoal and the Kalayaan Island Groups as a “regime of islands.” In a statement, Trillanes attributed the exclusion of Scarborough Shoal »Read More

  • Denial, neglect undermine fight vs human trafficking—UNODC

    23 February 2009

    MANY governments are still in denial about people being trafficked and, worse, neglect to report or prosecute cases of modern slavery, the United Nations on Drugs and Crime said. “Many criminal justice systems belittle the seriousness of this crime,” said UNODC Executive Director Antonio Maria Costa at the Feb. 12 worldwide launching the Global Report »Read More

  • Kidnappings on the rise again, says anti-crime NGO

    16 February 2009

    KIDNAPPINGS in the country have returned to an all-time high, averaging one incident every other day, an anti-crime NGO said Tuesday. The Citizens Action Against Crime recorded a dozen kidnap-for-ransom cases from Jan. 8 to Feb. 5, four of which occurred in Metro Manila and eight in Mindanao.  The figure excludes the kidnapping on Feb. »Read More

  • Palace baseline option prevails in Congress

    9 February 2009

    MALACANANG got its way in drawing the country’s archepelagic baseline after all. Both the Senate and the House of Representatives agreed in Monday’s bicameral conference to adopt the Palace position to treat the disputed Kalayaan Island Group (KIG) and the Scarborough Shoal as “regimes of islands of the Republic of the Philippines” instead of enclosing »Read More