AFP denies having list of communist leaders to be arrested

The Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) denied on Friday that it had prepared a list of communist leaders to be arrested following President Rodrigo Duterte’s proclamation declaring the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) and New People’s Army (NPA) as terrorist groups.

“I do not know of such list,” Col. Edgard Arevalo, chief of the AFP Public Information Office said in a press briefing in Camp Aguinaldo. “We do not have such a list.”

But if warrants of arrest would be given to the AFP then that would be the time it would draw up such a list, he added.

According to a newspaper report, the military and other defense agencies had finished drawing up its list of individuals linked with the CPP-NPA. The alleged list included the National Democratic Front (NDF) consultants released by the government last year in time of the peace talks.

Duterte signed the proclamation declaring the CPP-NPA as terrorist groups last Tuesday, Dec. 5.

The proclamation, which was made in accordance with the Human Security Act (Republic Act no. 10168), also directs Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre II to file a petition for proscription before a regional trial court to formally classify the groups as terrorists. /atm