ACT Teachers Party-list Rep. France Castro urged the government to again implement the Comprehensive Agreement on Respect for Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law following reports of aerial bombings near schools in Kalinga and Cagayan, as well as encounters that disrupted classes in Masbate.

Castro sought an investigation of these incidents by the Joint Monitoring Committee established under CARHRIHL.

“It is by implementing CARHRIHL and reactivating the JMC that the aerial bombings and artillery shelling in the municipality of Balbalan in Kalinga by the Armed Forces of the Philippines in civilian communities and near schools can be investigated. The aerial bombings in Baggao, Cagayan should also be probed as well as the massive militarization in Rodriguez, Rizal which residents say are a prelude to bombing runs of the AFP. The incidents in Masbate can also be lodged to the JMC,” the lawmaker said.

“The Marcos administration should not set this mechanism aside and instead utilize it. Such a mechanism may not entirely stop rights violations of combatants and civilians but at the minimum such violations can be properly probed, documented and addressed,” she added.

“That is why it is very important for the peace negotiations to resume and properly address the cause of the glaring inequalities in our society,” she said.

Castro cited the statement of former Bayan Muna Rep. Satur Ocampo saying that the CARHRIHL was the first major agreement signed out of the four substantive agendas of the peace talks.

The three others are social and economic reforms, political and constitutional reforms and cessation of hostilities and disposition of forces.