NDF demands disclosure of full wanted rebel list

LUCENA CITY—The head of the communist-led National Democratic Front of the Philippines on Saturday asked the government to publicly disclose the list of 235 rebel leaders carrying a total of P467 million in rewards for their capture.

“We want to ascertain whether a judicial arrest is the basis of the listing,” said Luis Jalandoni in a statement sent by e-mail.

He said the government can use the list to justify “the use of death squads if it does not release all the names for public scrutiny.”

“Keeping the names secret is a license for harassment, abductions and extrajudicial killings,” said Jalandoni, a former priest.

In a joint order, the Department of the Interior and Local Government and the Department of National Defense offered hundreds of millions of pesos in rewards for the capture of communist rebel leaders.

Leading the list of wanted rebel leaders are Benito Tiamzon, top New People’s Army leader; his wife Wilma Tiamzon, head of the Communist Party of the Philippines’ national finance commission; Jorge Madlos, spokesperson of the NDF in Mindanao; and Leoncio Pitao, NPA Eastern Mindanao head.

Jalandoni said the names that were disclosed by government are only a fraction of those that are on the list, which he described as “anomalous and ominous.”