POLITICS   Various religious, youth, cause-oriented and civil society groups are set to hold a march throughout the city of Manila on June 30 to sustain efforts opposing the Constituent Assembly being planned by allies of the President. The protest action has also been billed as a countdown to the State of the Nation Address of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo on July 27.

ENVIRONMENT   The news of a United Kingdom firm, Pacific Bio-Fields Holdings Plc., acquiring 400,000 hectares of land in northern Luzon which it can use for 50 years for free may be staggering but not surprising, according to green groups.

ENERGY & OIL   Due to continued overpricing, oil firms collect about P167.03 million in extra profits daily from consumers, according to the latest study released by the multisectoral group Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan) as it questioned the latest round of oil price hikes that oil firms implemented last midnight.

POLITICS   Several religious leaders have vowed to never abandon the Filipino people in their struggle to defeat the regime’s attempt to change the Constitution. Arroyo, they say, “has surpassed the brutality and evilness of martial law.

HUMAN RIGHTS   So-called intelligence reports that there will be a big rally on Monday is no excuse for the House and the PNP to resort to the violent dispersal of the camp-out.

“Why my name is included in the “order of battle” is a mystery. Unless, that is, the armed forces considers my and NUJP’s advocacy for press freedom, as well as pressuring the government to end the killings, as the work of enemies of the state. Unless the armed forces views my job and my writing as threats to this nation.”

HUMAN RIGHTS  By Perla Aragon-Choudhury |  What happens when women are too poor to pay for their own contraceptive supplies and long for the government to step in an offer simple support for an operation that would stop their unwanted pregnancies and enable them to take control of their lives?

POLITICS   By Sweet Mary J. Cawicaan |  Nationally speaking, the First Time Voters Network said roughly 60 percent of the 2010 electorate will come from the age bracket of 18 to 40 years old.

LABOR   By Chit Estella  |  Vera Files |  If the heroism of the Olalias and other laborers could not be doubted, then why are they not remembered as heroes by the Bantayog ng mga Bayani Foundation?

MILITARY   The administration appears set to allow unspecified numbers of foreign military personnel into the country in early May 2009 for “disaster relief training exercises” despite the absence of treaties giving this legal basis as required by the Constitution.

HUMAN RIGHTS   Does the killing of anti-mining activist Eliezer ‘Boy’ Billanes highlight irregular links between some mining companies and the Philippine military - or was he killed by insurgents because it was feared he was about to be turned into a so-called military asset and informer?

HUMAN RIGHTS   By Claire Delfin |  While a very well-intentioned legal remedy, it is something that the Burgos family find “elusive.” Since August last year, they have been waiting for a Supreme Court decision on their plea for the high court to reconsider the Court of Appeals ruling, which stated Mrs. Edita Burgos had failed to show the military was behind the kidnapping of her son Jonas and that her evidence was either possibly fabricated or hearsay.

POLITICS   As administration allies push for amendments of economic provisions in the Constitution, research group IBON Foundation says that the resolution seeking to allow corporations to own land and land-based resources in the Philippines are based on an outmoded ideology which believes that liberalizing the economy to greater foreign investment will lead to development.

HUMAN RIGHTS   The Philippine government should investigate alleged “death squads” responsible for hundreds of targeted killings in Davao City and other in Mindanao, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today.

Clarita Alia, whose four sons were murdered by the Davao Death Squad, joins the Human Rights Watch in a press briefing today about extrajudicial killings in Mindanao. (File photo by Carlos H. Conde)

Related story: Inside the Davao Death Squad