You are warmly invited to join this consultation on SPC policies and priorities
10am – 1 pm, Saturday 20 March at the Study Centre, Yarra Theological Union, 98 Albion Rd., Box Hill. Best entry via 34 Bedford St. Click HERE for directions. Please RSVP by Friday 19th 3pm: 9899 4777 or admin@socialpolicyconnections.com.au

The Justice and International Mission Unit of the Uniting Church has been highlighting corporate responsibility issues relating to Nestle for some time now (in areas such as unethical marketing of infant formula and their actions in the Philippines). According to Australian Asia Workers Links Nestle is feeling the heat on a few different fronts at the moment. In February 25 the Nestle Ponda and Nestle Bicholim unions in Goa, India, held protest actions against trade union rights violations at Nestle Waters in Russia. The unions, members of the IUF affiliated Federation of All India Nestle Employees, condemned union-busting at Nestle Domodedovo and demanded the reinstatement of the union vice-chair Sergei Strykov. Last year Nestle unions in India won collective bargaining rights with the support of the IUF’s global Nespresure campaign, and are now extending the same global solidarity to Nestle workers in Russia. Six days earlier, on February 19, Nestle workers picketed the gates of the company’s factory in Montevideo, Uruguay, to demand rights and recognition for Nestlé workers and their unions in Russia and Indonesia.

What I’ve learned from Dr. King and Dorothy Day is modesty—one does what one can and lets the results go. … The closer we are to biblical wisdom, the less consumed we will be about proving ourselves and about ego and celebrity. The less we will know about the outcome in our lives. And that’s very helpful—you don’t have to know, just do it. Sounds simple, eh?

- Jesuit peace activist Daniel Berrigan who at one time was one of the FBI’s 10 most wanted

Now the Herald Sun has decided to run an online poll in relation to the sentencing of the woman labelled as ‘our worst mum’….

Christians face persecution for living out their faith in theocracies (religious rather than democratic rule), military and communist dictatorships and democracies around the world. Find out more

Act.

You can join the Just End Persecution network and take action.

At the moment we are asking people to get online and help Dr Alexis Montes, a lay leader in the health ministry of the United Church of Christ in the Philippines (UCCP) and his health Worker colleagues. There have been illegal arrests, disappearances and detentions.

Find out more, and take action (scroll down from this link).

Contact.

Just End Persecution – Antony McMullen, antony.mcmullen@victas.uca.org.au

• arrest warrants were issued in late 2007 against the four members of the Filipino security forces responsible for the abduction and torture of Pastor Berlin Guerrero on 27 May 2007;
• Fr Thadeus Nguyen Van Ly, a Vietnamese Catholic priest, was imprisoned on October 2001 with a sentence of 15 years (his ‘crime’ was writing a submission to the US Commission on International Religious Freedom and the Congressional Human Rights Caucus) but Fr Thadeus was subsequently released in 2004 after an international campaign for his release;
• in late 2006, three Muslim men were tried and convicted in Indonesia for the 29 October 2005 murders of three Christian teenage school girls who were beheaded with machetes as they were walking home from school in Poso, Central Sulawesi (a fourth girl escaped with wounds);
• Joel Flores, accused of having murdered United Church of Christ in the Philippines (UCCP) member Jose Doton (gunned down by two men on a motorcycle on 16 May 2006), was brought to trial for the murder on 3 October 2007 (it was the first case of the murder of a UCCP member since 2004 in which someone has been arrested for murder and brought to trial); and,
• Pastor Rinaldy Damanik, who was released from imprisonment in Indonesia on false weapons charges in November 2004 (he received 76,000 letters of support internationally while he was in prison).

Health Workers detained in the Philippines

Prepared late February 2010

Freedom is what we have—Christ has set us free! Stand, then as free people and do not allow yourselves to become slaves again.

(Galatians 5:1)

Dr Alexis Montes, a lay leader in the health ministry of the United Church of Christ in the Philippines (UCCP), is a victim of illegal arrest, disappearance and detention.

In the early morning (6am) of 6 February 2010, Dr Alexis (Alex) Montes was illegally arrested and detained by the 202nd Infantry Battalion of the Philippine Army and the Rizal Philippine National Police.

The Community Medical Foundation, Inc. (COMMED), where Dr Montes is currently employed, co-sponsored a First Responders Training for health workers in Morong, Rizal beginning 1 February 2010. Dr Montes was assigned to conduct the training. Reports say that more than 300 military and police raided the retreat center at gunpoint. They arrested the 43 participants before even searching the premises. Those arrested included another doctor, a nurse and a midwife. The military later showed a dubious search warrant as the basis for their raid. Dr Montes was blindfolded and taken away in a military truck to Camp Capinpin of the 202nd Infantry Brigade of the Philippine Army, at Samaploc, Tanay, Rizal, and has been denied access to lawyers, family, colleagues and pastors who have tried to visit him.

The military alleges that the training was actually on bomb making. They claim to have found C4 explosives, a pistol, a revolver, three grenades, three Claymore mines and an improvised landmine. (Philippine Daily Inquirer, February 7, 2010) However, Dr Melecia Velmonte who owns the retreat center where the training was being conducted asserted that the military had no witness to their search operations and could have easily planted the ammunitions. Dr Velmonte also gave a lecture on infectious diseases at the training, but was not arrested with the other participants. She and her son, Bob, demanded to see a search warrant when the military and police began their raid, but they were merely brushed aside. It was only after the participants of the training were already handcuffed that Police Superintendent Marion P Balonglong showed Bob a search warrant for a Mario Condes of Bgy Maybangcal, Morong, Rizal, wanted on illegal weapons charges.

The chair of the Commission on Human Rights of the Philippines (CHRP) visited the detainees and stated: “They are continuously handcuffed and blindfolded, they are not allowed to sleep, they are not allowed to feed themselves. Even when they use the bathroom, someone else is there to take off their underwear.”

A petition has been filed before the Supreme Court of the Philippines to compel the armed forces to bring the detainees before a court of law.

The UCCP has called for the respect of the human rights of Dr Montes and the 42 other detained health workers, including their rights to legal counsel, access to visitors, and due process. The UCCP has stated that Dr Montes is a respected leader in the healing ministry of the UCCP and have called for his release. The World Council of Churches has also called for the detainees immediate release.

Background on Dr Montes

Dr Montes has been a long-time staff of the United Church of Christ in the Philippines. From 1988- 2003, Dr Montes served as the Health Ministries Coordinator of the Christian Witness and Service program of the UCCP. He also served as Executive Secretary of Bishop Elmer Bolocon from 2001- 2002. He has been instrumental in the development of UCCP hospitals, but his passion as always been providing health services to the underprivileged. Dr Montes has helped develop the community based health programs of many of the UCCP’s institutions. Immediately prior to his service with The Community Medical Foundation, Dr Montes was developing community-based health programs of the UCCP Visayas Community Medical Center in Cebu City. He served as Assistant to the Administrator for Internal and External Programs and Projects from 2007-2009.

Dr. Alex Montes ministering the sick during a medical mission in Montalban, Rizal. (Photo courtesy of CHD/bulatlat.com)

Take Action Now: points to include in your email (see below – You Can Help)

Points to make in your email:

• Express deep concern at the arrest of 43 health workers on 6 February in Morong, Rizal.
• Ask that they be immediately and unconditionally released, expressing concern at reports that the search that allegedly found weapons and bomb-making materials did not follow proper procedure and was not independently witnessed.
• Express deep concern that they have been mistreated in detention, including being subjected to sleep deprivation and not being permitted to go to toilet by themselves and remaining handcuffed while going to toilet.

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“Australia remains committed to resettling Lao Hmong refugees, and encourages the Thai and Lao Governments to work with the UNHCR and countries that have agreed to resettle Lao Hmong.”
- Commonwealth Government of Australia

*UPDATE Feb 22 2010 – Hmong ‘resettled’
We requested that you write to the Embassy of the Lao People’s Democratic Republic (see below) about the deportation of 4,500 of ethnic Hmong from Thailand to Laos. The Government of Lao claims those deported have been resettled in new villages or their original homes. Please continue to take action (see below email action) whilst noting this new information.

In June 2008 the Justice and International Mission (JIM) Unit of Uniting Church (Victoria and Tasmania) asked supporters to contact the Government of Lao to ask that the persecution of ethnic Hmong, including Christian Hmong end. The JIM Unit pointed out at the time that the Government of Thailand has forcibly deported Hmong refugees back to Lao where they face the real threat of serious human rights abuses. This was despite the fact that Thailand has had international offers to assist in resettling Hmong refugees to Australia, the US, Canada and the Netherlands.

On 28 December 2009 the Government of Thailand forcibly deported 4,371 Hmong from the Huay Nam Khao refugee camp in the north of the country back to Lao, denying them access to representatives of the UN High Commissioner of Refugees in the process. It took 5,000 baton armed Thai soldiers to clear the refugee camp where the Hmong had been living since 2004. Journalists, UN officials and human rights workers were kept 12 km away from the camp while it was cleared. Mobile phone signals in the area had been jammed for two days prior to the deportations. The Thai Prime Minister, Abhisit Vejjajiva, claimed the removals back to Lao were voluntary. The Thai Government also claimed that it had guarantees from the Lao Government that none of the deported asylum seekers would face any retribution or persecution upon their return.

Among those deported were 158 Hmong, who were being held in another detention centre in nearby Nong Khai, and had been identified as “persons of concern” by the UN. This group had been promised UN assistance and resettlement to a third country. Australia, Canada, the US and the Netherlands were interviewing these people with a view to granting them permanent residencies.

The Age reported on 13 January, that hundreds of the Hmong who had been returned to Lao were being held in a detention camp in tents behind razor wire. The Australian Government has stated that the Minister for Foreign Affairs, The Hon. Stephen Smith, has repeatedly raised the situation of the Lao Hmong in discussions with his Thai and Lao counterparts. The Australian Ambassador in Lao is joining other representatives of foreign governments in Lao to press the Lao Government to guarantee the safety of the returnees and provide early access to them.

The Australian Government has stated that “Australia remains committed to resettling Lao Hmong refugees, and encourages the Thai and Lao Governments to work with the UNHCR and countries that have agreed to resettle Lao Hmong.”

General Persecution of the Hmong ethnic group
Amnesty International reports that thousands of ethnic Hmong are living on the run in mountainous jungle in Lao in constant fear for their lives. They are the descendents of rebel forces recruited by the CIA to fight against the communists when the Vietnam War spilled across the border into Lao. But despite no longer posing an apparent threat, they still are being targeted with significant force generations later by the Lao Government.

The Hmong live in scattered family and community groups in inhospitable regions and have to keep on the move in order to evade the Lao military, who have attacked them with semi-automatic weapons and grenades, both inside their camps and when they venture out to search for food. The Lao Government forbids journalists and human rights groups access to the part of Lao that the Hmong are thought to be hiding in.

Since the Vietnam War ended in 1975, the US Government has processed and accepted about 150,000 Hmong refugees in Thailand for resettlement in the US.

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Pia Miller (with husband Brad) supports Christian fair trade (thatsmelbourne.com.au)

The cross represents my Christian faith … and it is made under fair trade conditions, which is important to me.

Pia Miller, presenter on Postcards (Channel 9), has endorsed Christian fair trade items in the most recent edition of ‘home’ (Feb 27, Herald Sun). She says that the cross (pictured below), ‘represents my Christian faith … and it is made under fair trade conditions, which is important to me’.

'Fairly traded Cross' (detail from photo Chris Groenhout / Herald Sun)

JustAct congratulates Pia for her public comments in support of fair trade!

If you would like to support Christian fair trade go here.