Sison: Duterte’s ‘death squad’ vs sparrow units would be like ‘Oplan Tokhang’

President Rodrigro Duterte’s “death squad” against New People’s Army’s Sparrow Units would be like an “Oplan Tokhang” against rebel suspects, Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) founder Jose Maria “Joma” Sison said Wednesday.

Sison said President Duterte is giving military officers the “license to kill” anyone suspected of as a member of the NPA or a sympathizer, just like in “Oplan Tokhang” where the police had the license to kill drug suspects.

“This is like Tokhang being carried out against so-called rebel suspects. He would like to probably to kill NPA suspects by the tens of thousands that he has done under the rubric of Oplan Tokhang,” Sison said in an interview over ABS CBN News Channel.

“He’s giving out the license again to military officers to kill anyone in bus terminals, trunklines in urban areas just because they don’t like the looks of anyone, istambays suspected as a candidate for being a red fighter in the NPA,” he added.

President Duterte announced that he would create his own hit squad to match the sparrow units employed by the NPA during the Marcos era.

The Chief Executive said that this unit, which he dubbed as “Duterte Death Squad,” would match NPA’s “talent in assassinating people.”

READ: Duterte wants to create ‘death squad’ to counter NPA’s Sparrow Unit

Sison pointed out that NPA sparrow units “don’t exist anymore in that way that they existed in the 1970’s and 1980’s,” adding that Duterte is inventing the sparrow units to justify his own “death squad.”

“Duterte is just inventing what he imagines and multiplying them as if sparrow units are already under his own bed in the Malacañang palace,” he said.

“He’s inventing so many sparrow units to justify his own death squad which are illegal and in violation of internatiol law and also the laws of the Philippines,” he added.

Sison, however, acknowledged that there were incidents of NPA teams hitting elements of the Armed Forces of the Philippines. But he said these teams are “not necessarily Sparrow units.”

“I suppose that in Mindanao and in many places where the military are spread out, whether they are carrying out martial law or not, there are already incidents of NPA teams, not necessarily sparrow units, hitting elements of the AFP,” he said.   /muf