STATEMENT TO THE COURT
By PROF. JOSE MARIA SISON
1 July 2003
Your Honor:
Thank you for giving me this opportunity to express my views
and sentiments on so serious a matter involving my life and basic
rights.
I was legally admitted to the Netherlands on 23 January 1987
on a visitor's visum in the course of my global university lecture
tour. Then I was given a residence permit as a research consultant
of a department in the University of Utrecht.
Since I applied for political asylum in October 1988, I have
been provided with the social benefits for food allowance, housing
and insurance for health and third party liability because I have
been prohibited from taking employment commensurate to my professional
training and experience.
I have always considered it fair that I must have the basic necessities
of life according to the laws and treaty obligations of the Dutch
government, especially after the Raad van State recognized me
as a political refugee under the Refugee Convention and adjudged
me as someone under the absolute protection of Article 3 of the
European Convention on Human Rights.
Indeed, the Dutch authorities have provided me such basic necessities
according to law and established practice from October 1988 to
October 2002. For these, I have been grateful to the Dutch people
and to the Dutch government. However, these benefits have been
taken away arbitrarily and unjustly since November 2002.
It is cruel, inhuman and cynical for the current Dutch authorities
to argue that they have simply the power and authority to take
away from me every possible means of survival, that I have absolutely
no right in that regard and that they can ignore or violate the
laws and treaty obligations of the Dutch government, which require
respect for human rights.
By being deprived of the basic necessities of life, I suffer
the violation of my basic human right to life. My right to nonrefoulement
under the Refugee Convention and my right to the absolute protection
of Article 3 and entirety of the European Convention on Human
Rights are put at risk and are actually being violated. I am practically
being told and pressured to leave the Netherlands or else suffer
starvation, illness and death in the absence of food, shelter
and health insurance.
My right to due process is violated as I am being punished so
severely because of the false allegation of a heinous crime called
terrorism. It is bad enough that the withdrawal of social benefits
from me has upset my family budget and living conditions for more
than ten months already. I am also being outrightly deprived of
the right to private and family life as I am ordered in one official
notice to leave my house within three days and separate myself
from my own wife and son.
I am being driven to the streets and made an open target for
those who want to do me harm. The act of listing me in my real
name as a terrorist in official publications has the aim of demonising,
stigmatising and isolating me from the Dutch and other communities.
It has subjected me to a trial and conviction by publicity.
This is not the first time that I have been subjected to false
accusations and therefore to persecution by the Dutch authorities.
The Manila government as well as the US government supplied the
Dutch government with so many false accusations against me in
order to interfere in my asylum case and prevent the grant of
asylum.
The Dutch justice ministry parroted such false accusations from
1990 to 1997. And it never showed any sign of remorse or embarrassment
when in 1998 the Manila government through its own justice secretary
issued an official certification stating that there were no pending
criminal charges against me.
It is deplorable that the Law Unification Chamber (REK) of the
Aliens' Court in 1997 ran counter to the decisions of the Raad
van State that it is against the principle of sound administration
to use secret dossiers against me and that if there is no other
country to which I can transfer, without putting at risk or violating
my right under Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights,
the Dutch government has no choice but to grant me asylum and
the permit to reside in the Netherlands.
To this day, there is no criminal charge filed against me by
any government before any court. Definitely, there is no formal
charge of terrorism against me before any court in the world.
The charge of murder being belatedly fabricated against me in
Manila is in flagrant violation of the Hernandez political offense
doctrine in Philippine jurisprudence.
It is likewise in violation of the Joint Agreement of Safety
and Immunity Guarantees and the Comprehensive Agreement on Respect
for Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law in the peace
negotiations between the Manila government and the National Democratic
Front of the Philippines.
I wish to declare categorically that I am not a terrorist. I
have in fact been a proven victim of the state terrorism of the
US-sponsored Marcos fascist dictatorship. I am a political refugee,
recognized as such under Article 1 A of the Refugee Convention
by the Raad van State, the Office of the UN High Commissioner
for Refugees and Amnesty International. Even the Dutch government
and the REK have recognized me as a political refugee since 1997.
I abhor terrorism, be it the terrorism of the alleged private
group that attacked the World Trade Center on 11 September 2001
or the state terrorism involved in the killing of 1.5 million
Filipinos by the US aggressors from 1899 to 1913 or in the killing
of at least 100,000 Filipinos and dislocation of millions of Filipinos
by the US-supported Marcos fascist dictatorship.
The act of listing me as a terrorist first by the US government
and then by other governments under the influence of the US government
is baseless and arbitrary. It has a malicious political motivation.
It is calculated to intimidate and pressure me as the chief political
consultant of the National Democratic Front of the Philippines
in its peace negotiations with the Manila government.
It is regrettable that the Dutch government is actively participating
in a campaign to persecute me and goes to the extent of depriving
me of the basic necessities of life and violating my basic human
right to life. This government is doing so even after the UN Security
Council issued Resolution 1452 dated 20 December 2002 and the
Council of the European Union issued Regulation EC No.561/2003,
dated 27 March 2003, requiring Member States to allow basic necessities
of life to individuals in the list of suspected terrorists.
In its 15 May 2003 decision on my application for interim measures,
the European Court of First Instance in Luxembourg declared that
the aforesaid UNSC resolution and CEU regulation require the Member
States (the Dutch state in my case) to allow those individuals
in the list of suspected terrorists to have the basic necessities
of life.
It is a vicious act of inhumanity to take away from persons
like me, who are presumed to be innocent until proven guilty in
a court of law, food, medicine and other basic necessities that
no decent government takes away even from convicted murderers
in prison. The people in the Netherlands and other countries understand
this point very well. Thus, so many of them have joined the international
solidarity campaign to defend and support me in my current travail.
I take this opportunity to thank all of them.
I am glad that the people of the world oppose the US and other
governments for using the events of 11 September 2001 to justify
and unleash wars of aggression, undertake political repression
and violate human rights and international humanitarian law. By
doing so with complete impunity, these governments are pushing
down humanity to a hellish situation of unbridled crisis, fascism
and war and are doing far worse than any of the private groups
previously trained by the US Central Intelligence Agency and special
forces to engage in terrorism. #