‘WHY WERE THEY SO CRUEL?’
Liezl Bandiola’s face was half blown off. Five others had fatal wounds in the head or face.
“There was no gunfight,” said Ruth Salditos, wife of Felix Salditos, one of seven alleged New People’s Army ( NPA) rebels killed in what authorities said was a gunfight with policemen and soldiers in San Jose, Antique on Wednesday.
Salditos was a painter whose works on indigenous peoples were featured in Inquirer in 2009.
At a press conference here on Thursday, families of the slain men accused the police and Army’s 301st Brigade of killing their loved ones while they were “unarmed and probably sleeping.”
Police story
“Why were they so cruel? They could have arrested them,” said Lina Mecinas, wife of Peter Mecinas, 60, who was earlier identified as Rene Agustin.
Officials said the seven had been killed after they clashed with lawmen who had been serving arrest warrants against two of the men past midnight on Wednesday.
They said there was a 30minute gunfight before the alleged rebels were found dead inside a house in San Jose. No one was hurt from the raiding team.
Chief Supt. John Bulalacao, Western Visayas police director, denied allegations that the men were summarily killed.
“We are ready to be investigated. There was no massacre,” he said.
Superior numbers
Bulalacao said no one in the raiding team was wounded because they were “wellpositioned and were in superior numbers.”
But Reylan Vergara, of the human rights group Karapatan, said the guns found on the slain men were “rusty” and the bullets were incompatible with the weapons.
He said “all indications” showed there was no clash.
Lina Mecinas said her husband, Peter, came from a “landlord” family in Antique but chose to help farmers without pay.
“He can live comfortably without working but he chose to devote his time to help the poor,” she said.