MANILA, Philippines — Relatives of victims of a 2009 massacre in the southern Philippines that left 58 people dead, more than half of them media workers, marched Wednesday to the presidential palace in Manila to protest the lack of convictions in the ongoing trial seven years after the killings took place.
Other relatives attended a Mass and lit candles at a southern cemetery where some victims are buried to mark the anniversary of the Nov. 23, 2009, massacre in Ampatuan town, the bloodiest election-related killings in the Philippines and the world’s worst single attack on journalists.
The victims were traveling in a convoy of vehicles when they were flagged down and escorted to a hilltop where police and gunmen loyal to a local warlord are accused of summarily executing and burying them in mass graves. The brazen killings were allegedly an attempt to prevent the provincial strongman’s rival from contesting elections.
“It’s been seven years but we have not seen any progress,” Arlene Lupogan, a widow of one of the slain journalists, told reporters as she suppressed tears.