EDITORIAL - Investigate Bloody Sunday

Some sectors are now asking authorities to look into a series of police operations in Calabarzon that left nine people dead last Sunday.

According to reports, policemen in Calabarzon picked that day to serve arrest warrants on several people in various operations. Some were arrested and others allegedly resisted arrest, resulting in their deaths.

How many ended up getting killed after they allegedly resisted arrest? Nine.

According to a report in Philstar.com, the dead included activist leader Emmanuel Asuncion of BAYAN-Cavite, who was shot in a raid at the Workers' Assistance Center in Dasmariñas, and couple Chai and Ariel Evangelista, who were killed in an operation in Nasugbu, Batangas.

Also killed were Montalban SIKKAD urban poor group members Makmak Bacasno and Michael Dasigao. The rest of those killed have yet to be identified.

It would be more likely and believable if several did try to resist with deadly violence, necessitating a reaction in kind, but nine?

That the bloodbath came days after President Rodrigo Duterte ordered state security forces to “kill” all communist rebels in the country also raises suspicion that policemen were out for blood, egged on by the president’s words.

However, let’s give the police the benefit of the doubt, let’s say a good number of those subject to arrest really decided to resist using deadly weapons. All the details of the operations have yet to come out after all.

Still, such a high body count deserves looking into.

One thing we have to be concerned about is that if indeed state security forces were heeding the call of the president to just do off with the communists is that they really can’t tell who is a communist and who is an activist, a point we have wanted to drive home for a long time.

If this is the case --and we really hope it isn’t-- we can only expect there to be more bloody Sundays, or any days of the week for that matter, ahead.