Fourteen church leaders and activists from Canada, India, Indonesia, Singapore, South Korea, Switzerland, Taiwan, Thailand, the United Kingdom and the United States, embarked on a Pilgrim Team Visit to the Philippines from August 9-13. They listened, learned and bore witness to the escalating human rights crisis in the country. The visit was convened by the World Council of Churches in partnership with the National Council of Churches in the Philippines.
The pilgrims visited an urban poor settlement in metro Manila and a key site for the “war on drugs”, peasants struggling for land rights in Cavite and Negros, indigenous Dumagat communities resisting a hydroelectric dam project, and Lumad communities displaced from their resourcerich ancestral domain.
In Navotas City, home to the third largest fishing port in Southeast Asia, a team of pilgrims heard from mothers and families of victims of extra-judicial killings. The “war on drugs” has illegally claimed thousands of lives and has gained considerable international attention, culminating in the recently released United Nations resolution which calls for an investigation.