Netherlands: Leader to be expelled
01 July 1996
Professor Dr Jose Maria Sison (57), head of the Phillipines Communist Party (CPP), who sought political asylum in the Netherlands eight years ago and has been involved in legal proceedings ever since, is now to be expelled within weeks, not to the Philippines but to a country of his choice. The Dutch government has tried everything to get rid of Dr Sison, whom it considers to be a dangerous terrorist leader, but so far he has always won his appeals and the Raad van State (the highest appeal council) twice recognized him officially as a refugee. It is widely believed that the government's campaign against Dr Sison is
motivated by substantial economic interests and strong pressure from the US government.
Philippino president, Mr Fidel Ramos, recently called upon Dr Sison to return to his country, promising that he would be safe there, but human rights organizations have warned that the communist leader would risk being killed at the hands of death squads. There is still an unofficial price on his head of one million pesos, dead or alive. Mr Ramos was responsible for the nine-year detention and repeated torture of Dr Sison under the Marcos government between 1977 and 1986.
Dutch legal experts have expressed their disbelief and criticism about the government's position, calling the present decision "insane" and "a text riddled with beginner's mistakes". They have pointed out that there is no solid ground for the accusation of "terrorist activities", an argument also put forward by the Raad van State, and that in the Philippines itself, there is no outstanding warrant against Dr Sison. The government says its decision rests on a letter written by the Binnenlandse Veiligheidsdienst (BVD, the Dutch internal security service) in March 1993. This letter, based on confidential information, states that Dr Sison as the head of the CPP is directly responsible for the terrorist activities of the New People's Army, and alleges that meetings have been observed between Dr Sison and representatives of other terrorist organizations from around the world.
In 1991 a Dutch television crew filmed an attempt by a joint BVD-CIA team to lure another Philippino in Holland, Mr Nathan Quimpo, into a cooperation agreement to collect information on Dr Sison. The particularities of the Sison affair call to mind the fate of former CIA officer Philip Agee, who sought asylum in Holland in 1977 but was bluntly refused after the Americans brought substantial pressure to bear on the social-democrat Dutch government. The ending of the Cold War does not seem to have changed all that much in some ways: a Dutch progressive-liberal cabinet can still be bent to prevailing winds.