Soldiers of the 19th IB repeatedly visited two minors in their home in Barangay Paco, Las Navas to force them to “surrender.” The youth were identified as Emman Yanay, 17 years old, and Mercel Yanay, 15 years old.

The siblings are children of peasant Edwar Yanay whom the military and government have long targeted in the surrender campaign whom the military accused of having the links to the revolutionary armed movement. The siblings are being forced to surrender so that they can be used as hostages to lure out their father and eventually force his surrender.

The 19th IB soldiers repeatedly summoned the minor siblings to its headquarters in Barangay Opong, Catubig. Fearing for his life, the older sibling Emman fled their home in Barangay Paco and remains missing as of now according to relatives.

The 19th IB soldiers are harassing and intimidating other Yanay family members. Their victims include Edwar’s sibling Resi and her two nephews from sibling Dandan. Dandan is a poor peasant whom the 19th IB is also forcing to surrender.

The National Democratic Front-Eastern Visayas (NDF-EV) condemned the forced surrender of minors and the military harassment against the Yanay family. The group also denounced the 19th IB soldiers for using fake names when facing the family, calling it a tactic to evade accountability.

NDF-EV spokesperson Ka Celine Manlimbasog said pressuring and targeting the children and families of those they seek for the state’s surrender program is a usual modus operandi of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP). She said these incidents only show the AFP’s scheme to break up and scatter families.

“This further exposes the absurdity of the Marcos regime’s surrender campaign,” Manlimbasog said. Many of those the 8th ID parades as “surrenderees” do not do so out of their own volition but are terrorized and coerced by the military.

Meanwhile, the 19th IB arrested civilian Edmond Cabides Baluyot on April 1 on charges of murder and portrayed him as a “rebel leader” in the area. Baluyot is a resident of Barangay Victory, Las Navas.

Information gathered by NDF-EV said the military targeted Baluyot for arrest because of a past physical confrontation with a soldier of the 19th IB. Baluyot reportedly questioned the soldiers’ illegal military rules imposed on their barangay including hamlet operations or “lockdown.”

Amid intensifying cases of human rights violations by the 8th ID in Eastern Visayas, Manlimbasog said it only further compels the people to support and join the New People’s Army. “Their brutality and injustice will only hasten the strengthening of the people’s army,” she said.

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