The following is a list of chronological attacks attributed to the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP), and its armed wing the New People's Army (NPA) which is a major participant in the Communist rebellion in the Philippines.
Attack | Date | Location | Deaths | Injuries | CPP-NPA admitted responsibility | Notes | Ref. |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Plaza Miranda bombing | August 21, 1971 | Plaza Miranda, Manila | 9 | 95 | No | Also blamed on the government of President Ferdinand Marcos. An article from The Washington Post alleged that high ranking CPP official said that the bombing was a means to provoke Marcos' administration. CPP founder Jose Maria Sison has denied the communist rebels role in the bombing. | [1] [2] |
1976 logging truck attack | November 22, 1976 | Enroute Mambusao, Davao Oriental | 6 | 3 | No | Suspected communist rebels launched an ambush against a logging truck killing including a municipal police chief. | |
1976 Clark Airbase raid | November 22, 1976 | Pampanga | — | — | No | Suspected communist rebels staged a raid on 5 barrios situated on the perimeter of the Clark Air Base, seizing 43 weapons from the local CHDF militia. | |
Rano massacre | June 25, 1989 | Digos, Davao del Sur | 37–39 | — | Yes | Occurred in a chapel affiliated with the United Church of Christ in the Philippines. Most of the victims were part of the Ituman anti-communist vigilante group who refused to pay "revolutionary taxes" to the NPA. The NPA accepted responsibility but justified their action as retaliation for previous attacks. | [3] [4] [5] [6] |
2021 Masbate City blast | June 8, 2021 | Masbate City | 2 | 1 | Yes | A bomb, either a landmine, or an improvised explosive device (IED) planted by the NPA to target government forces kills footballer Keith Absalon and his cousin Nolven as they were jogging by. After widespread condemnation, the NPA apologizes for the incident. | [7] [8] [9] [10] |
Target | Date | Location | CPP-NPA admitted responsibility | Notes | Ref. |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Porferio Branzuela | December 27, 1988 | Plaridel, Misamis Occidental | Yes | Mayor of Calamba, Misamis Occidental. Killed along with a police driver in an ambush. | [11] |
James Rowe | 1989 | Quezon City | Yes | American colonel working with the Joint US Military Advisory Group. He and his driver were attacked while en route to Rowe's workplace for being directly involved in the counter-insurgency. | [12] [13] [14] [15] |
Javier Hizon | January 5, 1990 | Mexico, Pampanga | Yes | Mayor of Mexico. Killed along with a police officer as he left his workplace. | [16] |
Conrado Balweg | December 31, 1999 | Malibcong, Abra | Yes | Former NPA member and Cordillera People’s Liberation Army leader. Killed at his residence due to "crimes against the Cordilleran people and the Revolutionary Movement" and his role in splitting the communist movement in the Cordilleras | [17] |
Carlito Pentecostes Jr. | April 21, 2014 | Gonzaga, Cagayan | Yes | Mayor of Gonzaga. Killed in front of the municipal hall after a flag-raising ceremony for his alleged role in the arrest of a rebel leader and for supporting black sand mining in his town. [18] | |
Mario Okinlay | 2014 | Impasugong, Bukidnon | Yes | Mayor of Impasugong. Killed in a roadside ambush for supporting the government's counter-insurgency program. | [19] |
The New People's Army, abbreviated NPA or BHB, is the armed wing of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP). It acts as the CPP's principal organization, aiming to consolidate political power from what it sees as the present "bourgeois reactionary puppet government" and to aid in the "people's democratic revolution". Founded on March 29, 1969, by the collaboration of Jose Maria Sison and former members of the Hukbalahap led by Bernabe Buscayno, the NPA has since waged a guerrilla war based on the Maoist strategy of protracted people's war. The NPA is one of the key figures in the ongoing Communist rebellion in the Philippines, the longest ongoing conflict in the country.
The Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) is a far-left, Marxist–Leninist–Maoist revolutionary organization and communist party in the Philippines, formed by Jose Maria Sison on 26 December 1968. It is designated as a terrorist group by the United States Department of State together with Sison and its armed wing New People's Army (NPA) in 2002. The European Union renewed its terrorist designation on the organization in 2019, though a 2009 ruling by the EU's second highest court delisted Sison as a "person supporting terrorism" and reversed a decision by member governments to freeze assets. According to the US' Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) World Factbook, the CPP and the NPA aims to destabilize the Philippines' economy and overthrow the national government.
Jose Maria Canlas Sison, also known as Joma, was a Filipino writer, poet, and activist who founded and led the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) and added elements of Maoism to its philosophy—which would be known as National Democracy. His ideology was formed by applying Marxism–Leninism–Maoism to the history and circumstances of the Philippines.
2000 in the Philippines details events of note that happened in the Philippines in the year 2000.
The New People's Army rebellion is an ongoing conflict between the government of the Philippines and the New People's Army (NPA), which is the armed wing of the Marxist–Leninist–Maoist Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP). It is the world's longest ongoing communist insurgency, and is the largest, most prominent communist armed conflict in the Philippines, seeing more than 43,000 insurgency-related fatalities between 1969 and 2008. Because the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) which is the legal wing of the CPP, is often associated with the conflict, it is often also called the CPP-NPA-NDF conflict, or simply the C/N/N conflict, especially in the context of peace talks with the Philippine government.
Martial law in the Philippines refers to the various historical instances in which the Philippine head of state placed all or part of the country under military control—most prominently during the administration of Ferdinand Marcos, but also during the Philippines' colonial period, during the second world war, and more recently on the island of Mindanao during the administrations of Gloria Macapagal Arroyo and Rodrigo Duterte. The alternative term "martial law era" as applied to the Philippines is typically used to describe the Marcos martial law period specifically.
1987 in the Philippines details events of note that happened in the Philippines in the year 1987.
1988 in the Philippines details events of note that happened in the Philippines in the year 1988.
The history of communist armed conflicts in the Philippines is closely related to the history of Communism in the Philippines, with various armed conflict linked to the armed wings of the various communist organizations that have evolved since 1930. The two largest conflicts have been the Hukbalahap Rebellion of 1942–1954, and the ongoing rebellion of the New People's Army, which began in 1969 under the auspices of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP). But various splinter groups have since separated from the CPP and have had a history of armed conflict with the Philippine government since then.
The following is the timeline of events of CPP-NPA-NDF rebellion, a conflict between the government of the Philippines, the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP), the New People's Army (NPA) and the National Democratic Front (NDF).
The Second Great Rectification Movement refers to a 1992 ideological campaign initiated by the leadership of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) wherein an effort was made to "identify, repudiate and rectify the errors of urban insurrectionism, premature big formations of the New People's Army and anti-infiltration hysteria". The rectification movement resulted in the once monolithic Filipino communist party fragmenting into at least eight warring factions during the 1990s.
Wilma Tiamzon was a Filipino political organizer and until her arrest in March 2014 by Philippine security forces, believed to be the Secretary-General of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) and its armed wing, the New People's Army (NPA).
Red-tagging in the Philippines is the malicious harassment and blacklisting of individuals or organizations critical or not fully supportive of the actions of a sitting government administration in the country. These individuals and organizations are "tagged" as either communist or terrorist or both, regardless of their actual political beliefs or affiliations. It is a type of incitement and has pernicious effects on its targets. Red-tagging may be performed by either security forces, government officials or shills.
The National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC) is a task force organized by the government of the Philippines in 2018 as part of its "Whole-of-Nation approach" to respond to and raise awareness about ongoing communist armed conflicts in the Philippines, after the administration of President Rodrigo Duterte formally terminated peace talks between the Philippine government and the New People's Army in November 2017.
Keith Absalon, a collegiate footballer who played for the FEU Tamaraws in the University Athletic Association of the Philippines (UAAP) and his cousin, Nolven, were killed when they ran over an explosive, reportedly a landmine or an improvised explosive device, that was set up by the New People's Army (NPA) in June 2021 in Masbate City, Philippines.
The Rano massacre, also known as the Digos massacre, refers to the aftermath of an incident which occurred in the village of Rano in Digos, Davao del Sur on June 25, 1989 which resulted to the death of 39 people. The New People's Army claimed responsibility for the deaths but insisted that anti-communist vigilantes among the victims fired at them first.
In August 2022, a motorboat carrying rebels of the New People's Army exploded in Catbalogan, Samar. The explosion killed the passengers including NPA leaders Benito and Wilma Tiamzon.
The Alsa Masa was a rightwing vigilante group in the Philippines initially formed in early 1984 specifically to combat the New People's Army in Barangay Agdao, Davao City. It was then later revived and expanded in April 1986 with the support of the Philippine Constabulary's Davao Metro District Command. It was created at a time when the NPA was still experimenting with approaches like urban insurrectionism, creating an atmosphere of extreme violence in Mindanao. However, Alsa Masa itself was soon noted to also be a perpetrator of numerous human rights violations, creating a cycle of violence in the locality. Many of Alsa Masa's members were later recruited into the Civilian Armed Forces Geographical Units which the Philippine government created in July 1987.