The Philippine elections commission should immediately reverse a decision denying a political party representing lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) Filipinos from taking part in the 2010 elections, Human Rights Watch said in a letter to the chair of the elections commission.

The massacre of at least 47 people in Maguindanao in the southern Philippines tragically shows the failure of Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s administration to hold accountable perpetrators of extrajudicial killings.

Human Rights Watch writes to the Honorable Jose A.R. Melo to convey concern about the decision of the Commission of Elections (Comelec) to deny the petition of the Ang Ladlad LGBT Party for party-list accreditation to contest the May 2010 elections.

US President Barack Obama should urge Asian leaders at the first ASEAN-US summit to unite in addressing the region’s most pressing human rights concerns.

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton should press President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo of the Philippines to prosecute military members responsible for politically motivated killings.

Courts in Davao City and Manila should cooperate fully with investigations into death squad killings, in line with recent recommendations by a UN body, instead of undermining efforts to bring killers to justice.

The United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child should press the Philippines government to take meaningful steps to investigate death squad killings and prosecute the perpetrators.

During the Committee on the Rights of the Child’s review of the Philippines on September 15, 2009, we urge you to give special attention to the execution-style killings of children by “death squads” that operate with virtual impunity in Davao City and elsewhere in the Philippines.