Journalist shot, wounded in Northern Philippines

CMFR/PHILIPPINES – A journalist and human rights activist the military has tagged as a supporter of the New People’s Army (NPA), the armed wing of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP), was shot and wounded by still unidentified assailants on Tuesday, 6 August 2019 in Lagawe, Ifugao province.

Ifugao province is 247 kilometers north of Manila.

Brandon Lee, 37, was standing outside his house when he was shot at around 6:00 p.m., the online news site NorDis (Northern Dispatch)  reported.

NorDis Editor-in-Chief Kimberlie Ngabit-Quitasol told CMFR that Lee was critically wounded and is being given appropriate medical assistance. He sustained gunshot wounds on his right upper face, with the bullet exiting his right neck and another on his left back, according to the spot report of the police.

Lee is a correspondent of NorDis, an alternative media outfit headquartered in Baguio City. He is also a paralegal volunteer for the Ifugao Peasant Movement (IPM).

“A citizen of the United States, Lee volunteered to assist the Ifugao Peasant Movement  in 2010. It was in this same period that he started contributing stories on Ifugao events and issues,” NorDis reported. Lee is among those individuals tagged by the military in 2015 as supporters of the NPA.

In a statement, NorDis said the incident “strikes the deepest concern that our outfit has long expressed that red-tagging will eventually result in attacks against our correspondents and staff.” The Cordillera Human Rights Alliance (CHRA) condemned the incident and said that elements of the 54^th Infantry Battalion of the Philippine Army were frequenting the IPM office and the residences of Lee and others weeks before the incident. Prior to the attack, Lee had been “consistently subjected to different threats and harassment, even in social media.”