Manila, 30 June 2014 — A religious community in the Philippines is taking on the issue of enforced disappearances in Asia and initiating a campaign in collaboration with Focus on the Global South.
The Association of Major Religious Superiors of the Philippines’ Office of Women and Gender Concerns, together with Focus, launched ‘Let Us Not Forget’ campaign through a solidarity mass at the University of Santo Tomas in Manila on June 30. The Asian Federation Against Involuntary Disappearance participated in the mass and campaign launch.
The groups will conduct a ritual for remembering every first Saturday of the month to uphold the campaign for the safe return of Sombath Somphone of Laos and other “desaparecidos” – victims of enforced disappearance – in Asia.
At the mass, officiating Catholic priest of the UST, Father Quirico, reminded those who were gathered that “forgetting about human dignity is a social sin” that serves as the “root of evil doings” such as forcibly abducting and disappearing people.
