MANILA: President Benigno Aquino yesterday rejected perceptions that his administration had done little to ensure a free press, with 26 journalists murdered since he assumed office in mid-2010, saying most of the cases were not work-related.
During his joint press conference with US President Obama, he denied the figure cited by a Fox News reporter who wanted to know how the Aquino government had tried to solve the cases of 26 journalists killed on his watch.
Aquino explained that 62 cases had been reported, but only 10 were found by an inter-agency committee to be legitimate cases of extrajudicial killing.
“Of the 10 cases that have been determined to be possible cases, only one happened during our watch, the case of Mr Rodel Estrellado,” he said, noting that Estrellado’s case passed the “criteria, definitions of what constitutes an extrajudicial killing.”
Aquino also hinted that the murder of journalists in this country was not always work-related, which is why law enforcement agencies occasionally withhold some information out of concern for the victims’ families.
“If at times we do not reveal the discoveries by our intelligence agencies, perhaps we are very sensitive to personal relationships of the people who were killed not because of professional activities but, shall we say, other issues,” he said.
The Philippine Star
