A party-list representative is pushing for a congressional investigation into a military operation in Negros Occidental that left 19 people dead, as competing accounts from the Armed Forces of the Philippines and human rights organizations deepen questions about what actually transpired.
ACT Teachers Rep. Antonio Tinio filed the call on Saturday, urging the House Human Rights Committee to look into last week’s encounter between the 303rd Infantry Brigade and alleged New People’s Army fighters in the northern part of the island. The military described the incident as a “running firefight” with communist rebels. Critics say the dead were not all combatants.
Among those confirmed killed were Alyssa Alano, identified by the UP Diliman Student Council as its education and research councilor; RJ Ledesma, a coordinator for Altermidya Network’s Negros Island journalists’ group; and two peasant advocates, Maureen Keil Santuyo and Errol Wendel, named by groups Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas and Tanggol Magsasaka.
Tinio said a probe must establish accountability beyond the military’s standard post-operation framing. “We cannot accept a blanket ‘encounter’ narrative that automatically justifies the deaths of 19 people,” he said. “Congress must investigate what happened in Toboso.”
He outlined specific questions he wants answered: “who gave the orders, what the rules of the engagement were, whether excessive force was used, and whether there were violations of international humanitarian law and basic human rights.”
Human rights group Karapatan characterized the incident as a “massacre,” citing what it described as “excessive force” by the military. The Communist Party of the Philippines, whose armed wing the NPA has been fighting the government for over five decades in one of Asia’s longest-running insurgencies, alleged that at least five of those killed were civilians and that the operation may constitute a “war crime,” according to a Philippine Collegian report.
The NPA insurgency has claimed more than 40,000 lives since it began.
