The Filipino People Refuse to be Empire’s Laboratory

Dear Iqbal ,

We write to you from Manila, just days after the Philippines government revealed plans to buy intermediate-range missile launchers from the United States. The Progressive International Delegation landed in the Philippines on the same day that Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. signed two laws defining the country’s maritime boundaries and setting designated sea lanes, a move immediately opposed by China, which reasserted its claims over territories including the Scarborough Shoal.

Beneath the headlines about sovereignty and sea lanes lies a more devastating story: of a nation on the frontlines of a new Cold War, climate catastrophe, and corporate plunder.

Progressive forces scored a major victory in 1987 when the Philippines adopted a constitution prohibiting foreign military bases – unless approved by the Senate – ultimately forcing US troops out of the country in 1992. Yet today, through a web of “security agreements” bypassing constitutional requirements, the US has engineered its return through use of nine military bases, and turned the Philippines into a laboratory for a New Cold War with China.

The Progressive International delegation travels to the Philippines, amidst these fears of imminent escalation, to convene an urgent discussion with the country’s progressive forces: trade unions like the National Federation of Labor, Manggagawa sa Komunikasyon ng Pilipinas (MKP) and United Filipino Service Workers (UFSW); political parties like Partido Manggagawa, Partido Lakas ng Masa and Partido Sosyalista; social movements Kabataan Partylist, Akbayan Youth, Stop the War Coalition Kilusan para sa Repormang Agraryo at Katarungang Panlipunan (KATARUNGAN) and LILAK (Purple Action for Indigenous Women’s Rights); research institutions like the UP Center for Integrative and Development Studies Program on Alternative Development (AltDev); and broad formations such as Kilusan Para sa Pambansang Demokrasya (KPD) and Alab Katipunan. We see the stakes clearly: Internationalism or Extinction.

As the delegation arrives in Manila, Typhoon Toraji has just ravaged the northern Philippines – the fourth major storm in less than a month. The last two typhoons and a tropical storm before Toraji caused more than 160 deaths, damaged thousands of houses and farmlands and affected more than 9 million people, including hundreds of thousands who fled to emergency shelters.  Another tropical storm, Usagi, is two days away from the coast of Luzon.

These are not merely natural disasters: the Philippines bears the brutal impacts of a climate crisis it did little to create. While the Philippines contributes less than 0.4% of global greenhouse gas emissions, it ranks among the countries most vulnerable to climate change impacts.

In Bukidnon, known as the country’s “food basket,” multinational giants like Del Monte and Dole operate vast plantations on contested indigenous lands. Land defenders face deadly consequences: when Renato Anglao, Secretary General of the Tribal Indigenous Oppressed Group Association, demanded the return of ancestral lands, he was gunned down in 2017 in front of his wife and five-year-old son by three unidentified assailants. No one has been prosecuted for his murder. According to Global Witness, similar patterns of violence against land defenders connected to large agribusiness operations persist across the region.

This deepening militarization has met sustained resistance. Earlier this year, thousands marched against expanded military presence in Manila. In the Province of Zambales, indigenous Aeta communities have protested the expansion of military facilities on their ancestral lands, warning that military activities threaten their sacred spaces.

The Progressive International’s delegation, led by Co-General Coordinator Varsha Gandikota-Nellutla, brings Ecuador’s Former Foreign Minister Guillaume Long and PI Council Members Walden Bello and Clarissa Mendoza to discuss the struggles for independence, land, peace and dignity with peasant movements, trade unions, legislators and social movements. The liberation that the people of Philippines dream of depends on defeating the interlocking systems of military domination, climate destruction, and corporate plunder.

In solidarity,

Progressive International Secretariat