Low-paid workers in 'militarized' Export Processing Zone. Photo courtesy International Trade Union Confederation.

A politician whose wife, sisters and relatives were among 57 people killed in the southern Philippines because he wanted to contest elections next year, registered his candidacy on Friday.

In what the Philippine Government feels is a major development to ease tension and get justice for massacre victims in Maguindanao The Philippine Secretary of Justice has requested formally that a special trial court be set up the Philippine supreme court to handle the trial in the capitol in Manila.

There will be no special treatment given to the Ampatuan political clan amid its alleged involvement in the massacre in Maguindanao even though President Arroyo is inclined to keep her friendship with them, a senior Palace official said Thursday.

Deputy Presidential Spokeswoman Lorelei Fajardo said they are “glad” that Mayor Andal Ampatuan Jr. of Datu Unsay town has been placed in custody in connection with the massacre, and assured the prosecution of those involved regardless of power and influence.

“But it doesn’t mean that we are no longer friends with them if they are guilty. I think that should be treated separately,” Fajardo said. “The function of the President as head of state (is) that the law should apply to everyone whether they are friends, allies or relatives.”

The confirmed death toll in the Philippines massacre has risen to 52, with the prospect of further bodies being discovered.

Officials found 11 more bodies Wednesday at the site of an attack on an election caravan in the south, bringing the death toll in the massacre to 57, and police said they are investigating a member of a powerful clan allied with the president's administration.

Wednesday, November 25, 2009 at 8:04 a.m. MANILA, Philippines - Alejandro "Bong" Reblando, a veteran Filipino journalist and former Associated Press stringer, was among at least 18 reporters killed in an attack on an election caravan, authorities said.

DAVAO CITY, the Philippines: Unidentified gunmen seized on Monday 40 people, including 20 journalists, in the province of Maguindanao, southern Philippines.

The Philippine president, Gloria Arroyo, left, has received strong electoral support from Andal Ampatuan, second from right.

MANILA: At least 21 people were killed in the southern Philippine province of Maguindanao yesterday, in what the authorities described as one of the country*s worst cases of political violence in recent memory.

Yesterday forty six people were slaughtered in Maguindanao. The news is reporting it as a feud between two datu clans among the Moros.

Map locates Peshawar, Pakistan, where militants have been killed in an assault on insurgents blamed for a wave of bombings Map locates Maguindanao and Sultan Kudarat provinces in the Philippines, which President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo placed under a state of emergency A police officer uses banana leaves to cover bodies which they recovered from a ...

President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo will not order the disarmament of the Ampatuans despite the political family's alleged involvement in the kidnapping and gruesome killing of at least 24 people in Maguindanao, an Islamic studies professor said Tuesday.

Outraged senators on Tuesday challenged President Arroyo to go after her political allies, the Ampatuans, who have been tagged in the massacre of at least 22 people, including women, in Maguindanao on Monday.

... last week with the filing of candidacies for more than 17,800 national and local positions. Elections in the Philippines are usually marred by violence, especially in the south, where security forces are battling communist rebels, Islamic radicals ...

Gunmen ambushed a caravan of political supporters and journalists on their way to file election papers, killing at least 24 people in a massacre considered shocking even for a region notorious for violence between rival clans.

In this July 21, 2008 photo released by the Presidential Close-in Photographer's Office, Malacanang Palace in Manila, President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, right, is welcomed by Congressman Didagen Dilangalen, left, and Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao Governor Datu Zaldy Ampatuan, upon arrival at Maguindanao, Shariff Kabunsuan Province, in the ...

Reporting from Seoul and Zamboanga City, Philippines -- Twenty-four people were found dead in the southern Philippines after scores of gunmen on Monday kidnapped a caravan of supporters accompanying a woman en route to file her husband's nomination papers to run for provincial governor, authorities said.

Police in the Philippines are looking for a Hawaii man who allegedly killed the son of a government official during a road-rage shooting.

A judge reserved ruling Monday on whether a former Philippine National Police officer who served prison time for receiving classified U.S. government documents will be extradited to face murder charges back home.