News Briefs: Dec. 6, 2018

PDEA chief to ex-deputy: Air your side on ‘shabu’ smuggling

Come out and face the music. This was the advice of Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) Director General Aaron Aquino to his former deputy for administration, Ismael Fajardo, who had reportedly gone in hiding after being accused of involvement in the multibillion-peso “shabu” (crystal meth) smuggling case being investigated by the Senate and the House of Representatives.

Fajardo was one of three government personnel linked to the entry into the country in August of two magnetic lifters found at the Manila International Container Port and four others in General Mariano Alvarez, Cavite.

Aquino said the magnetic lifters had contained shabu worth a total of about P14.4 billion.

Former customs intelligence officer Jimmy Guban, Fajardo’s classmate at the Philippine College of Criminology, linked the former PDEA official to the shipments. —Jaymee T. Gamil

De Lima laments PH ‘human rights calamity’

Detained Sen. Leila de Lima on Wednesday urged human rights advocates to unite and confront what she described as the prevailing human rights calamity in the country.

In a speech read for her by her chief of staff at the National Summit of Human Rights Defenders (HRD) in Quezon City, De Lima said that, alongside the campaign for the passage of a law that seeks to provide protection to human rights workers, there should be a campaign to end social injustices.

“[W]hile there should be a project dedicated to the [enactment of] the HRD Protection Act, the endeavor should be pursued … alongside the campaign against the widespread human rights calamity that now devastates not just our civil liberties and political freedoms, but also our economic, social and cultural rights,” she said.

The summit is being held to mark the 20th anniversary of the UN Declaration on Human Rights Defenders. —Melvin Gascon