Mary Jane Veloso’s accounts reveal the realities of Filipino migrant workers who are victimized by human traffickers. Mary Jane’s family and supporters call for President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. to grant her clemency, a conditional release of a person deprived of liberty (PDL), mitigating the consequences of criminal liability.
“We hope that our government will put Mary Jane in a safe place, and that she will be granted clemency by our government,” said Celia Veloso, Mary Jane’s mother, during the program commemorating the birth of Andres Bonifacio last November 30 (Saturday).
Veloso’s case was brought to international attention after she was sentenced to die in Indonesia. Prior to this, her family spent more than five years seeking government assistance to prove that she was a victim of human trafficking.
Raymundo said that as of early October, Israeli forces launched over 4,000 attacks in northern Lebanon, using white phosphorus and fuel bombs, destroying more than 1,000 hectares of land and displacing around 9,400 people.
“Despite the government’s claims, Copeland did not participate in any protests during the International Observers Mission."
MSF recorded that only 17 out of 36 hospitals in Gaza are partially functional. Six of their staff have also been killed and since October 2023, their team and patients have had to leave 14 health infrastructure due to attacks.
October 7 marks the Al-Aqsa Flood, an operation led by Hamas and Palestinian nationalist groups to resist the illegal occupation of Israel in Gaza.
Around 17,000 children have been killed and almost 26,000 children live without one or both parents in Israel’s ongoing genocidal war on Gaza.
“The youth will never be ‘too young’ to speak their minds and truths. Student encampments have shown the capacity of the youth to lead communities on the basis of justice and peace."
From 2018 to 2024, research group Ibon Foundation has seen the most number of participating countries through the Balikatan Exercises. In this year’s Balikatan, 17 countries participated — a large number compared to the 2018 Balikatan which only involved four countries.
This entanglement between settler colonialism and imperialism has been exposed by non-stop protests worldwide. More recently, the brave and impactful university and college encampments in North America and Europe have made at least one thing clear: the war on Palestine does not consist of two equal sides, occupier-occupied.
During the protest, Filipino activists decried that the Philippines is next only to India in terms of purchases of armaments from Israel amounting to billions. Last year alone, a $114 million contract between the Philippines and the Israeli government was forged for refurbishing two planes for intelligence gathering. Such contracts, the group said, help fund Israel’s genocidal wars against the Palestinian people.
Women activists gathered in front of the United Nations Headquarters in New York City on March 21, 2024 to express their support for Palestine.
Filipino-American activists here denounced ongoing attempts to change the Philippine Constitution as this may result in increased US military presence in the Philippines and worsen the geopolitical tension in the West Philippine Sea.
Human rights group Karapatan urged the governments of Germany and the Czech Republic to raise concerns on the “dire lack of accountability and the continuing killings in the Philippines” as Ferdinand Marcos Jr. is on a state visit in the said countries.
According to Migrante-Netherlands, Marikit Saturay was not allowed to talk to her lawyers and her relatives. A uniformed agent was also assigned to guard her during the entire detention period.
