Philippines: Human rights defender released after 40 days in jail

View of Manila (illustration photo).

© AGPD Productions/Pixabay

Text by: RFI Follow

1 min

A Filipina doctor accused of being a leader of the Maoist rebellion and detained for 40 days in a prison in the south of the country has been released after a judge dropped the charges against her.

The arrest and detention of this doctor had been condemned by many NGOs who denounced the abusive repression by President Duterte of more than a thousand opponents. 

Advertising

Read more

Maria Natividad Castro was arrested in Manila on February 18.

A 2020 court order ordered that she be tried for kidnapping.

The 53-year-old doctor was further accused of being a member of the central committee of the Communist Party of the Philippines.

" 

," says his former employer, the NGO Karapatan, which indicates that the arrest came after an investigation into alleged human rights violations led by Maria Castro in the unstable region of Mindanao.

A regional judge finally decided to release her for procedural reasons.

According to the NGO Karapatan, at least 60 other people, considered political prisoners, have also been released in recent months by the courts, on procedural and substantive grounds.

President Rodrigo Duterte

has intensified his repression against human rights defenders whom he accuses of supporting the communist insurrection during his mandate.

The failure of the peace negotiations initiated by Duterte in 2017 with the Maoist rebels had led to a merciless repression against opponents of the regime accused of belonging to the Communist Party and its armed wing, qualified as terrorist organizations.

Newsletter

Receive all the international news directly in your mailbox

I subscribe

Follow all the international news by downloading the RFI application

google-play-badge_EN

• Philippines

• Human rights

• Rodrigo Duterte