ROXAS BACKS PUNOS VIEWS ON TERROR WAR

SENATOR MAR ROXAS is supporting the views of Supreme Court Chief Justice Reynato Puno that the fight against terrorism must not be at the expense of human rights.

I agree with the Chief Justice that we should not allow the use of legal shortcuts to advance the fight against terror. In fact, the anti-terror campaign should not be used as a fig leaf for haphazard intelligence work and ideological profiling, Roxas said in a statement.

Roxas called on the government to undertake specific measures to ensure that its anti-terror campaign is built on facts and evidence rather than conjectures and biases.

We need a systems and process check to fill in gaps in intelligence-gathering and curb the temptation of legal shortcuts to achieve what is already a difficult goal, he added.

Roxas pointed out that the information systems of key government agencies in the fight against terrorism, such as the National Bureau of Investigation, the Bureau of Immigration, the Department of Foreign Affairs, and the Philippine National Police, should be run on a unified platform that allow these agencies to share and validate information in real time.

How can we help detect and fight terror at the local levels if at the national level these agencies are not interconnected in data-gathering and other forms of intelligence work? the senator asked.

Roxas cited two of the bloodiest terror attacks in the Philippinesthe bombing of the Light Rail Transit on December 30, 2000, and the kidnapping of 20 tourists from the Dos Palmas Resort in Palawan on May 27, 2001as prime examples of why the government needs to boost intelligence gathering and national security through modernization.

The senator from Capiz warned, however, that while fighting terrorists was of the highest priority in terms of national security, it must not dictate upon or interfere in how Filipinos should conduct their lives.

I voted against the anti-terror law because there were provisions in it that were in conflict with human rights and other constitutional rights, he explained.

The anti-terror bill, or the Human Security Act of 2007, allows warrantless arrests, surveillance, and seizure of bank assets, among others.