In a statement released today, the Apolinario Gatmaitan Command – New People’s Army Negros Island (AGC-NPA) called on the revolutionary ranks in the island to militantly face and frustrate AFP chief of staff Gen. Bacarro’s declaration of increased ‘operational tempo’ against Reds.

“The recent mandate is no different from previous regimes. It will also fail and result to bloody and widespread human rights violations,” AGC-NPA spokesperson Ka Juanito Magbanua said.

He stated further that the people expects intensified militarization in the countryside caused by battalion-sized AFP operations indiscriminately bombing communities, harming livelihoods and the environment, perpetrating illegal arrests based on trumped-up charges, planting of fake evidence, and enforcing torture, killings, and massacres.

According to Magbanua, heightened combat operations are part of the AFP’s tactic to drive away locals and pave the way for foreign corporations and agribusiness ventures.

The AGC-NPA also decried the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict’s (NTF-ELCAC) fake surrender campaign which it said is one of the AFP’s source of corruption money.

“Red fighters and commanders must intensify waging extensive and intensive guerilla warfare in an ever widening and deepening mass base to give justice to victims of human rights violations and to advance the people’s war to victory,” ended Magbanua.

Meanwhile, Ka JB Regalado, spokesperson of the NPA’s Leonardo Panaligan Command – Central Negros Front (LPC-NPA) claimed responsibility for two deaths and one wounded personnel of the 62nd Infantry Battalion after mounting a harassment operation against a military detachment in Sitio Casingan, Barangay Trinidad, Guihulngan City, Negros Oriental last August 30.

The Roselyn Jean Pelle Command (RJPC-NPA), NPA Northern Negros Guerilla Front, through its spokesperson Cecil Estrella, also affirmed punishing proven criminals and counterrevolutionaries in Calatrava. NPA operatives meted death punishments against Rodel Nobleza in Barangay Marcelo on August 7, Renato Estrebillo from the same barangay in August 12, and Lalong Barangay Captain Benjamin Javoc last August 26. An ingram submachine gun with ammunition was retrieved from Javoc’s household.###