Dear Friends in the Environment and Climate Movement:
 
We need your light in these dark times.

Filipino environmental defenders and climate protectors face prospects of authoritarianism “worse than Martial Law,” as retired Supreme Court Justice Antonio Carpio described it, with President Rodrigo Duterte’s signing of the Anti-Terrorism Law, RA 11479.
 
Under President Duterte’s regime, defenders have faced various dangers in protecting at least 6.2 million hectares of ecologically critical landscapes and seascapes in one of the world’s most biodiverse and natural resource-rich, yet most climate-vulnerable countries.

The Global Witness Report described the Philippines  as “the world’s deadliest country for environmental- and human rights defenders.”
 
This ‘Terror Law’ will worsen this human rights situation with overbroad definitions of what constitutes a terrorist, criminalization of free speech, warrantless arrests, and illegal detentions, among others.
 
We thus ask you and/or your organization to be a signatory of a global petition we will publicly launch on July 14, GMT+8, to pressure the Duterte administration to repeal this much reviled law. The petition text can be found below for your reference. We ask you to keep this discreetly confidential until its public launch.
 
Should you be willing to be part of this global solidarity initiative, please register the name of your organization’s chief representation, title/position, and organization’s full name in this Google Form.
 
May we also request you to send a high-quality portrait photo of your chief representation and your organization’s logo to greensvsatl@protonmail.com for the publicity materials we will be producing to launch the petition.
 
Thank you for standing with us for a just and safe common future.
 
As one planet we fight,
 
Naomi Klein
Journalist and Social Activist

Gloria Steinem Endowed Chair in Media, Culture and Feminist Studies
Rutgers University

Greta Thunberg
Climate Activist
Fridays for Future

Lia Alonzo
Secretariat Coordinator
Asia Pacific Network for Environmental Defenders (APNED)

Executive Director
Center for Environmental Concerns - Philippines

Norly Mercado
Asia Regional Director
350.org

Mitzi Jonelle Tan
Convener
Youth Advocates for Climate Action Philippines (YACAP)
 
Clemente Bautista, Jr.
International Networks Coordinator
Kalikasan People’s Network for the Environment (Kalikasan PNE)



xxx petition text follows xxx


 
Stand with Filipino Environmental Defenders against the Terror Law!
 
The global environmental and climate justice movement stands together with Filipino environmental defenders and climate protectors in rejecting the Anti-Terrorism Act of 2020. condemning the Philippines’ President Rodrigo Duterte for signing the Anti-Terrorism Law.
 
Dubbed  the ‘Terror Law,’ this draconian law will further worsen an already atrocious human rights situation where the Philippines was dubbed as the world's deadliest country for land and environmental defenders in 2019.[i]
 
The Anti-Terrorism Law’s overbroad definition of what constitutes a terrorist, legalizing detention up to 24 days without charges, enabling warrantless arrests of ‘suspected persons’ by law enforcement agents, and  suppression of freedom of expression and right to privacy,[ii] all threaten the work of Filipino indigenous people, small farmers, artisanal fishers, forest workers, and environmental activists operating in one of the global frontlines of the ecological and climate crisis.
 
Defenders have been attacked in the first three years of the Duterte administration while protecting at least 6.2 million hectares of watershed forests, agricultural lands, coasts, and seas.[iii] These are important landscapes and seascapes in one of the world’s 18 mega-biodiverse countries[iv] that is also the 5th most mineralized[v] and 2nd most climate-vulnerable nation in the world.[vi]
 
Often standing up against big mining, logging, agribusiness, and infrastructure considered by government as ‘vital installations’ and ‘critical investments,’ at least 19,498 defenders have been subjected to terror-tagging and other human rights abuses in these three years under President Duterte.[vii]
 
Environmental defenders are the first and last line of defence for our planet. In this era of runaway climate crisis and pandemics emerging from nature under siege, we cannot have laws that undermine our ability to protect our right to a balanced and healthful ecology and the right to life.
 
We thus demand the Duterte administration, through the Philippine Congress, to repeal the Anti-Terrorism Law.