Son of Guatemalan 'desaparecido' brings hope to families of disappeared Filipino activists

Samuel Villatorro was only 8- years old when his father, Amancio, was abducted and disappeared by the Guatemalan army on March 11, 1984.

Amancio was 47 years old and had just assumed leadership in the National Labor Union, after its president was disappeared. Amancio was among the 45,000 people disappeared during the civil war in Guatemala.

Last year, Samuel found the remains of his father in a mass grave, the first to be among the 5,000 remains dug up through the years.

Samuel’s story had heartened the families of disappeared that he met in the country, particularly Lorena “Aya” Santos, whose father Leo Velasco, a peace consultant of the National Democratic Front (NDF) was disappeared by suspected state agents on February 19, 2007.

“My father was disappeared six years ago. For Samuel, it took him 29 years, but he was still able to find his father’s remains. Maybe not all hope is lost for the families of desaparecidos,” Santos, who is also the Secretary General of the Families of the Disappeared for Justice or Desaparecidos, said in a statement sent to the Mindanao Examiner.

Samuel was a delegate of the recently concluded International Conference for Human Rights and Peace in the Philippines. He took part in a campaign called "My Name is Not XXX" which was an effort to put an image of the disappeared so as not to be forgotten by the Guatemalan society.

The campaign led to the retrieval of remains in mass graves located in former military camps. The remains were subjected to DNA tests and one of the dead was identified to be Amancio Villatoro.

His remains were found, together with 220 more bodies in an indigenous people's community in San Juan Comalapa, Country of Chimaltenango where locals used to witness people coming in a military camp and never seen to come out. The locals knew many were buried in that place. More than 200 remains were retrieved with traditional clothing while six, among of them was Amancio were wearing modern clothes like t-shirts and pants. Amancio was wearing a pair of denim pants.

Several regimes after the civil war in Guatemala provided enough space for families of the disappeared to search for their loved ones. With the support of international non-government organizations, a machine that does DNA tests was donated to Guatemala to identify the retrieved remains of desaparecidos.

"The situation in the Philippines brings me back to the time when my father was still disappeared, giving me strong emotional clash." Samuel said.

Samuel was also a member of the Southern Tagalog Team of the International Solidarity Mission where together with other Latin American delegates, he interviewed victims of human rights violations in the heavily-militarized communities in Bondoc Peninsula, Quezon province.

There are two documented enforced disappearance in Southern Tagalog under the Aquino Administration - Felix Balaston and Alfredo Bucal.

"Meeting Samuel is like meeting a brother from a distant land. Both our fathers stood up for the principles they believed in," he said. "Government violence unites victims of rights violations, and it’s amazing how an international conference like this brings victims together, to take the struggle for justice and peace globally."

Monday 22 July 2013

http://www.mindanaoexaminer.com/news.php?news_id=20130722015503

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8 bodies believed to be migrants found in Bahamas

The police are investigating the circumstances surrounding the discovery of eight bodies on the beach in Grand Bahama early Saturday.

They initially found six bodies, including that of a child on a beach at Holmes Rock, shortly after, two more bodies were discovered near a sunken boat, half a mile from the shore.

According to the police, it's believed that all eight were illegal immigrants who were trying to make their way to the United States.

Assistant Commissioner of Police Hulan Hanna said further checks were carried out along the shoreline and at sea to ensure that there were no other bodies.

"We got the assistance of the Americans and they took us about a half mile from the shore, and we were able to see a boat submerged in the water. Outside of the boat, two bodies were seen on the floor of the sea."

He said assistance was being sought to refloat the boat as additional bodies could be inside.

"We are hoping that our regional and international connections will help us determine who these people are."

Hanna appealed to the public to contact the police if they knew anyone, particularly from the area, who has been missing.

He said the identities of the victims were not known and added that autopsies would be performed to determine the cause of death.

"We don't know the nationalities of the victims definitively, but again, the enormity of what we met here cannot be emphasised enough... please for God's sake, and listen to us and do not do it to put your life at risk, and the greater tragedy is the fact there is a child who has no more chance at life because somebody took a decision to have the child accompany them to this ill-fated journey," Hanna said.

Grand Bahama island lies less than 100 miles (161 kilometers) east of Florida.

Monday 22 July 2013

http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/news/8-found-dead-off-coast-of-Grand-Bahama_14720264

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Search resumes in Lac-Mégantic with new specialized equipment for 5 still missing

Recovery work in Lac-Mégantic resumed early Sunday morning after taking a day off to wait for specialized equipment coming in from Montreal.

Three cranes are now on site in the red zone in Lac-Mégantic, lifting tankers that, in some cases, still contain oil products.

Sgt. Benoit Richard of the Sûreté du Québec said the tankers can’t be pushed or dragged because of the presence of oil, and also to preserve the possible bodies underneath them.

On Sunday afternoon, mayor Colette Roy-Laroche and members of provincial civil security announced that evacuees of about 180 homes would be able to enter their houses and apartments this week to collect some personal belongings, such as medicines.

Firefighters and other workers will also visit some homes to check refrigerators and deep freezers for rotting food that could be releasing micro-organisms hazardous to people`s health.

So far, the remains of 42 of the 47 people presumed to have perished in the July 6 train explosion have been found.

Twenty-two of the 42 bodies found have been formally identified at this point in time, though only 19 of the names have been publicly released.

The SQ said it believes the remaining five people may be in locations they were previously unable to search. The specialized equipment, including a particular crane, will help move oil tankers and rubble so crews can search in strategic locations.

A crew of Montreal firefighters was also deployed and are expected to work in Lac-Mégantic for the next three weeks.

Monday 22 July 2013

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/story/2013/07/21/montreal-lac-megantic-quebec-identifying-dead-red-zone.html

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At least 47 dead and 300 injured as quake strikes Chinese farms

At least 47 people have been killed and nearly 300 others were injured when a strong earthquake in a dry, hilly farming area in western China knocked down power lines and damaged scores of homes, the local government said.

The quake hit near the city of Dingxi in Gansu province, a region of mountains, desert and pastureland. Residents described shaking windows and swinging lights but little major damage and little panic. Tremors were felt in the provincial capital of Lanzhou 110 miles north, and as far away as Xi'an, 250 miles to the east.

"You could see the chandeliers wobble and the windows vibrating and making noise, but there aren't any cracks in the walls. Shop assistants all poured out on to the streets when the shaking began," said a front desk clerk at the Wuyang Hotel in Zhang County about 25 miles from the epicentre.

With a population of 26 million, Gansu is one of China's more lightly populated provinces, although Dingxi has a greater concentration of farms in rolling hills terraced with fields for crops and fruit trees. Dingxi has a total population of about 2.7 million and is about 766 miles west of Beijing.

The deaths and injuries were reported in Min County and other rural southern parts of the municipality, Dingxi mayor Tang Xiaoming told state broadcaster CCTV. He said damage was worst in the counties of Zhang and Min, where scores of homes were damaged and telephone and electricity services knocked out.

Su Wei, leader of a 120-member rescue team from the paramilitary People's Armed Police, told CCTV that they were on their way to the epicentre, but progress was being slowed by mud and rock slides blocking the road.

The Chinese Red Cross said it was shipping 200 tents, 1,000 sets of household items, and 2,000 jackets to the area and sending teams from both Lanzhou and Beijing to help with relief work and assess further needs. Heavy rain is expected in the area later in the week, raising the need for shelter and increasing the chance of further landslides.

The government's earthquake monitoring centre said the initial quake at 7.45am local time (2345 GMT Sunday) was magnitude 6.6 and subsequent tremors included a magnitude 5.6. The US Geological Survey measured the magnitude of the initial quake as 5.9 and the depth at six miles. Initial measurements of an earthquake can vary widely, especially if different monitoring equipment is used.

The quake was shallow, which can be more destructive. The centre said it struck about 12.4 miles beneath the surface, while the Gansu provincial earthquake administration said it was just 3.7 miles deep.

China's worst earthquake in recent years was a 7.9 magnitude tremor which struck the south-western province of Sichuan in 2008, leaving 90,000 people dead or missing.

Monday 22 July 2013

http://www.independent.ie/world-news/at-least-47-dead-and-300-injured-as-quake-strikes-chinese-farms-29438116.html

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