ellen tordesillas Posts

Tribunal Verdict to be transmitted to the UN, ICJ and European Parliament

THE HAGUE, Netherlands – In a 13-page verdict read before about 300 people inside a church in this city March 25, the Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal (PPT) found both Philippine President Gloria M. Arroyo and U.S. President George W. Bush, Jr. and their respective governments as responsible for gross and systematic violations of human rights, economic plunder and transgression of the Filipino people’s sovereignty.

The verdict, read at the conclusion of the five-day second session on the Philippines by François Houtart, Session President, described the extrajudicial killings, forced disappearances, massacres, torture and other atrocities allegedly committed by the Arroyo government as “crimes against humanity”. Such violations which the PPT said were in no way justified as “necessary measures against terrorism”, must be stopped immediately.

Why Arroyo wife sought protection

Keep off Arroyos’ case:court

By Michael Lim Ubac
Inquirer

At the center of the legal battle between spouses Negros Occidental Rep. Ignacio “Iggy” Arroyo and Alicia Arroyo is not only the custody of their child but also the wife’s expressed fear for her life.

Alicia, a former banker and stockbroker who was the first woman and the youngest chair of the Philippine Stock Exchange, sought protection from the Quezon City Regional Trial Court in response to her husband’s petition for joint custody of their 9-year old daughter.

Iggy Arroyo obtains gag order in custody case

By Gil C. Cabacungan Jr.
Inquirer

Representative Ignacio Arroyo has succeeded in getting a court order barring his estranged wife, Alicia “Aleli’’ Arroyo, and her lawyer, Lorna Kapunan, from further disclosing details of the couple’s fight for custody of their nine-year-old daughter.
Arroyo’s lawyers, who claimed that the public disclosure of what was supposed to be a private domestic affair was politically motivated, said that the court’s gag order covered not only details of the marital dispute but also Aleli’s knowledge of the Jose Pidal account.

In a hastily-called press conference at the First Gentleman’s LTA Building in Makati, Arroyo appeared calm and collect as he read a prepared statement with his lawyers and advisers nearby, hardly the picture of a man caught in the middle of this year’s most sensational marriage break-up.

There’s a whale of a difference between being hungry because you want to shed off your excess fat and being hungry because you have nothing to eat. If Gloria does not understand that, she should be hauled to the mental hospital. Click here on Malaya’s editorial.

President Arroyo yesterday said that if simply missing a meal would qualify as experiencing hunger, then she considers herself a victim of hunger.

“Kasi iyun naman ang question ng hunger, do you miss one meal during the last three months? Pati naman ako, I’ve missed one meal in the last three months,” she said in an interview after a roundtable discussion on education and social services.