The abrogation of the US-RP Visiting Forces Agreement, along with other lopsided military agreements such as the US-RP Mutual Defense Treaty and the US-RP Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement, is a long-overdue measure to assert the country’s national sovereignty.
The abrogation of the US-RP Visiting Forces Agreement, along with other lopsided military agreements such as the US-RP Mutual Defense Treaty and the US-RP Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement, is a long-overdue measure to assert the country’s national sovereignty.
Under the VFA alone, US military forces committed with the gang rape of “Nicole” and the murder of Jennifer Laude in our own land. Filipina women became the sacrificial lambs in the rape of our sovereignty with these lopsided agreements—and yet, these cases along with the killing of Mindanaoans and the US-directed bombing of Marawi apparently weren’t enough for the government to consider terminating the VFA: it took Bato dela Rosa’s crybaby tantrums about getting his US visa revoked.
Using something as trifle as the cancellation of Bato dela Rosa’s US visa as reason to terminate the VFA speaks of the 1) Duterte administration’s pettiness and deplorably shallow understanding of the longstanding neocolonial relations of the US with the Philippines, and 2) the great lengths to which the Duterte administration can go to evade accountability for its human rights violations.
We urge the abrogation of VFA, MDT, EDCA and all one-sided interventionist agreements of the Philippine government with the US and other foreign nations, based on genuine understanding of assertion of an independent foreign policy. We likewise call for an end to all US military and police aid to the Philippine government for its sham drug war and counterinsurgency program and the various US functions with Philippine State security forces that exacerbate the human rights crisis that besets the country today.