A ranking official of the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC) dared the remaining New People’s Army (NPA) members to condemn the killings perpetuated by the group.
“If you truly believe in human rights, then denounce the killings your movement ordered,” NTF-ELCAC Executive Director Undersecretary Ernesto Torres, Jr. said in a statement marking International Human Rights Day.
He said the challenge also goes to the leaders of the NPA, the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP), the National Democratic Front (NDF), their front organizations, and “ideological apologists.”
“Condemn the executions your doctrine justified. Admit the unspeakable suffering your so-called revolution inflicted on the very people it claimed to liberate,” Torres said.
The NTF-ELCAC official issued the challenge after noting that the CPP-NPA-NDF still refuses to confront “the darkest truth of its legacy,” which resulted in the execution of thousands of Filipinos, including farmers, students, Indigenous People, activists, and even their own members.
Torres was alluding to the CPP-NPA’s previous internal campaigns, Oplan Zombie, Kampanyang Ahos, and Kadena de Amor, where thousands suspected of being government spies were killed.
He noted that the victims of the executions and their families deserve justice, stressing that peace is not merely the absence of conflict but also the “presence of justice, dignity and respect for every Filipino life.”
“As a nation, we must remain vigilant. The peace we enjoy today — felt in once conflict-stricken sitios, in classrooms finally safe for children, in barangays where commerce now hums — is a peace that must be sustained, protected and deepened,” he said.
Torres also called on the public and civil society groups to condemn the normalization of “NPA-style executions.”
“We call on all sectors — academe, youth, civil society, faith groups, LGUs, and media — to reject the normalization of NPA-style executions and ideological violence. Defend human rights with truth, not propaganda,” he said in a separate statement.
He added that human rights cannot be selective and invoked only when convenient or weaponized to shield perpetrators.
“The NPA’s documented killings — including recent ‘spy-tagging’ executions — are not mere statistics; they represent shattered families and communities terrorized into silence,” he said.
Torres earlier said NPA strength across the country has been reduced to only 780 from as high as 25,000 in the 1980s. (PNA)