Why attack defenders working for a 'Green New Normal'? [A Visual Thread] #COVID19 #StopTheAttacks #DefendTheDefenders

In the past two months since the regime of President Rodrigo Duterte initiated the world’s longest and most abusive COVID-19 lockdown, it has not let up on the attacks against environmental defenders who are responding to the pandemic.

The latest, in fact, is a fresh harassment of our national headquarters on May 15, 2020, at around 11:00 AM. Our office gates were defaced with posters red-tagging and vilifying progressive leaders and groups who we work with for environmental defense and social justice.

Just over six months ago, police personnel attempted to raid our office after months of monitored surveillance.

Our case is but the latest in a series of attacks that has affected at least 172 defenders since the imposition of the lockdown last March 15, 2020. Our fellow eco-warriors have been subjected to threats and intimidation, arrests and detention, and lawsuits.

Defenders who were already political prisoners prior to the pandemic remain languishing in jail, despite the COVID-19 outbreak already spreading in over-capacity prisons. Despite the UN urging governments to free low-level and political prisoners to save them from contagion.

A comrade dear to us, Jory Porquia, was murdered. The day before gunmen took his life, local police were threatening him for mounting relief operations to communities who have yet to receive aid from government.

And yet this is the overwhelming trend among all environmental defenders who face human rights abuses amid the COVID-19 lockdown. We are all working to bring food and nutrition to underserved communities facing land grabs and extractives.

Protecting rainforests to prevent emerging infectious diseases. Demanding a just transition from business-as-usual to a green and healthful economy and society.

On the other hand, the Duterte regime has sought to resume mining operations and ore shipments. It has mulled opening up coasts to land reclamation supposedly to stimulate the COVID-affected economy.

This is not the new normal we so urgently need.

We urge the Filipino public and the international community to condemn these attacks, and the deadly business-as-usual to which this brutal suppression serves. Demand the Duterte government to stop the attacks, and heed the people’s call for a green and just ‘new normal.’#

Reference: Urgent Alert - Arrests, harassment of environmental defenders amid COVID-19 pandemic in the Philippines - http://kalikasan.net/articles/urgent-alert-for-action-arrests-harassment-of-environmental-defenders-amid-covid-19-pandemic-in-the-philippines/

Reference: Urgent Alert - No let-up in attacks against environmental defenders amid militaristic COVID-19 lockdown in Philippines - http://kalikasan.net/articles/urgent-alert-for-action-no-let-up-in-attacks-against-environmental-defenders-amid-militaristic-covid-19-lockdown-in-philippines/