Un Group Opposes Detention Of Philippines Ex-President

The United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention believes the hospital detention of a former Philippines president is political persecution and a violation of international law, her legal counsel claimed Thursday.



Citing an email from human rights lawyer Amal Clooney -- who had taken the case to the U.N. -- Larry Gadon said the group had found Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo's hospital detention to be arbitrary and against international human rights law.



Clooney -- wife of U.S. actor George Clooney -- was "ed as saying the group had decided Arroyo's detention on corruption charges was politically motivated.



"The U.N. opinion finds that the detention of former President Arroyo was arbitrary and illegal under international law because the Sandiganbayan [People's Advocate] court failed to take into account her individual circumstances when it repeatedly denied her bail," said Clooney's email -- provided to the media by Gadon.



"Further, the Working Group recognized that the charges against Mrs. Arroyo are politically motivated, since she is detained 'as a result of the exercise of her right to take part in government and the conduct of public affairs' and 'because of her political… opinion,'" it continued.



Clooney was reported to have said that the U.N. Working Group recommended that the Sandiganbayan [anti-graft court] reconsider its decision denying her bail "and to accord Ms. Arroyo with an enforceable right to compensation… for the deprivation of liberty which already occurred.'"



She asked the world body to act quickly on the supposed persecution of Arroyo, who has already been under detention for three years for corruption.



Arroyo was arrested in connection with a case involving the alleged abuse of P366 million ($8 million) in funds from the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office from 2008 to 2010.



She is confined at the Veterans Memorial Medical Center in Manila as she claims to be suffering from cervical spondylosis, a degenerative disease of the bones and cartilage of the neck.



Arroyo -- whose father Diosdado Macapagal was also once president -- served as the 14th President of the Philippines from 2001 to 2010 and remains a member of the House of Representatives.



She was the country's second female president after Corazon Aquino. - Zamboanga