Days before the first year of the declaration of martial law in Mindanao on May 23, 2018, Karapatan received reports on the killing of an industrial worker of a banana plantation and the arbitrary arrest of a trade union organizer, both in the Southern Mindanao region.
Karapatan Secretary General Cristina Palabay said that “these two latest reported cases are emblematic of the type of human and people’s rights violations perpetrated by state forces in Mindanao under martial law – brazenly committed with impunity targeting civilians considered ‘enemies of the state.”