19 August 2020

A human rights leader has been killed in the central Philippines in what observers and rights defenders have said is a continuing escalation of the "war against dissent" under the administration of President Rodrigo Duterte.

Zara Alvarez, former education director of the human rights alliance Karapatan, died on the spot after being shot six times on Monday evening as she was heading home after buying food for dinner. She was the 13th member of the organisation killed since mid-2016, when Duterte came to power, the group said.

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Alvarez's death comes just weeks after Duterte signed into law controversial anti-terror legislation, which allows for warrantless arrests and longer detentions without charge - provisions that legal experts warned could be directed at anyone criticising the president.

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Alvarez, the 39-year-old rights leader killed on Monday, had been advocating for years for farmers' rights in Negros, a resource-rich island, where a few politically connected families own vast tracts of sugarcane plantations.

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Earlier on Monday, activists buried Randall Echanis, one of the land rights activists who negotiated for a peace deal with the Duterte administration.