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2)
HELD:
1) No, it is valid and constitutional. Article 2 of
our Constitution provides in its section 3, that
The Philippines renounces war as an
instrument of national policy and adopts the
generally accepted principles of international
law as part of the of the nation.
It is a generally accepted principle of
international law that all those person,
military or civilian, who have been guilty of
planning preparing or waging a war of
aggression and of the commission of crimes
and offenses consequential and incidental
thereto in violation of the laws and customs of
war, of humanity and civilization are held
accountable therefor. Consequently in the
promulgation and enforcement of Execution
Order No. 68 the President of the Philippines
has acted in conformity with the generally
accepted and policies of international law
which are part of the our Constitution.
War is not ended simply because hostilities
have ceased. After cessation of armed
hostilities, an important incident is the
adoption of measure by the military
command of seize and subject to disciplinary
measure those enemies who have violated
the law of war. Consequently, the President as
Commander in Chief is fully empowered to
consummate this unfinished aspect of war
namely the trial and punishment of war
criminal
through
the
issuance
and
enforcement of Executive Order No. 68.
Petitioner argues that respondent Military
Commission has no Jurisdiction to try
petitioner for acts committed in violation of
the Hague Convention and the Geneva
Convention because the Philippines is not a
signatory to the first and signed the second
only in 1947. It cannot be denied that the
rules and regulation of the Hague and
Geneva conventions form, part of and are
wholly based on the generally accepted
principals of international law. In facts these
rules and principles were accepted by the two
belligerent nation the United State and Japan
who were signatories to the two Convention,
Such rule and principles therefore form part
of the law of our nation even if the Philippines
was not a signatory to the conventions
embodying them for our Constitution has
been deliberately general and extensive in its
scope and is not confined to the recognition
of rule and principle of international law as
continued inn treaties to which our
government may have been or shall be a
signatory.
2)
3)
III
Appellant contends that the lower court erred in
finding appellee stateless and not a Russian
citizen and in not finding that he has failed to
establish that he is not disqualified for Philippine
citizenship under section 4 (h) of the Revised
Naturalization Law.
It is contended that petitioner failed to show that
under the laws of Russia, appellee has lost his
Russian citizenship and failed to show that Russia
grants to Filipinos the right to become a
naturalized citizens or subjects thereof. The
controversy centers on the question as to whether
petitioner is a Russian citizen or is stateless.
Petitioner testified categorically that he is not a
Russian citizen and that he has no citizenship. His
testimony
supports
the
lower
court's
pronouncement that petitioner is a stateless
refugee in this country.
Appellant points out that petitioner stated in his
petition for naturalization that he is citizen or
subject of the Empire of Russia, but the Empire of
Russia has ceased to exist since the Czars were
overthrown in 1917 by the Bolshevists, and the
petitioner disclaims allegiance or connection with
the Soviet Government established after the
overthrow of the Czarist Government.
We do not believe that the lower court erred in
pronouncing
appellee
stateless.
Appellee's
testimony, besides being uncontradicted, is
supported by the well-known fact that the
ruthlessness of modern dictatorship has scattered
throughout the world a large number of stateless
refugees or displaced persons, without country
and without flag. The tyrannical intolerance of
said dictatorships toward all opposition induced
them
to
resort
to
beastly
oppression,
concentration camps and blood purges, and it is
only natural that the not-so-fortunate ones who
were able to escape to foreign countries should
feel the loss of all bonds of attachment to the
hells which were formerly their fatherland's.
Petitioner belongs to that group of stateless
refugees.
Knowing, as all cultured persons all over the world
ought to know, the history, nature and character
of the Soviet dictatorship, presently the greatest
menace to humanity and civilization, it would be
technically fastidious to require further evidence
of petitioner's claim that he is stateless than his
testimony that he owes no allegiance to the
Russian Communist Government and, is because
he has been at war with it, he fled from Russia to
permanently reside in the Philippines. After
finding in this country economic security in a
remunerative job, establishing a family by
marrying a Filipina with whom he has a son, and
enjoying for 25 years the freedoms and blessings
of our democratic way of life, and after showing
his resolution to retain the happiness he found in
our political system to the extent of refusing to