By CAROLYN ARGUILLAS
MINDANEWS
MASSACRE SITE, Ampatuan, Maguindanao.—Justice Secretary Leila de Lima assured residents of Maguindanao that they have government’s commitment “to do all that we can” to convince the Supreme Court to allow live coverage of the trial” of the perpetrators of the now year-old Ampatuan Massacre, because “what is at trial are not just the accused, but our whole government system.”
“Until and unless justice has truly been done in this case, none of us could truly claim that the Filipino people have managed to reclaim their humanity,” said De Lima, who recalls having been to the site afew days after the massacre, in the company of forensics experts one of whom said the place reminded him of Rwanda.
The battle to bring those responsible for this “horror of horrors” is the quest of the entire Filipino people, she said, adding, “we have their (victims’) blood in our collective hands.” (Read the rest of the story in Mindanews.)
Mindanews’ Froilan Gallado joined the relatives, friends and colleagues of the victims of the Ampatuan massacre, and filed these photographs.